I'm not sure if my mom is as old-fashioned (or just silly) as most, but she's the type who would tell you not to stick your finger in your nose because a monster that lives in your nose would bite it off. In that same sentiment she used to say that if I kept making grotesque faces, it would actually stick and I'd be sorry. And I never believed her... Until today.
I boarded the N train this morning and actually grabbed a seat for once and a couple stops later an Asian man with really cool green and white sneakers and wool hat sat down across from me. I thought his squinting face was an effort to read the subway map behind me (I always, ALWAYS end up sitting right in front of the subway map without realizing it)... But it didn't stop. His eyes were all squinted and his teeth showed. The wrinkles in the bridge of his nose indicated he was scrunching it with effort. I couldn't actually see his eyes but each little wrinkle looked like a painful depiction of the mindset causing him to make this awful face. I couldn't look away. Damnit, the man was right across from me, and I thought maybe if I did stare at him, he would notice the grimace he was making and stop it immediately. Not so.
How does one acquire a natural state of a scrunched face? How much stress does this man have? Or did he have? Relax, man! Life is too short to ever be so stressed that your face would look the way it does.
I wonder what other supposedly "silly" things Mom told me that ended up being true.
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2 comments:
Shawn, I love this post! This same thing happened to Greg and me in Fred Meyer on Bakerview a few weeks ago. There was a Latino
(would that be correct?) family we kept running into down every aisle and the mother had the worst scowl on her face, much like you described. After about the fifth run-in, we figured out that the scowl was just how she looked...
Funny thing is I saw him again today on the N train on my way to work and pointed him out to Mike. What are the odds?
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