My selfie, myself
I recently finished reading the excellent, heartbreaking memoir Autobiography of a Face by the late Lucy Grealy, which made me ponder what role a face plays in one’s identity. A Twitter friend (who I actually know in real life — a wonderful poet) the other day referred to “selfies” (that is, self-portraits, particularly taken with a smartphone) taken by women when they think they’re looking good and posted on Instagram, as “milfies” (after the infamous “MILF!” line in the movie “American Pie”). It made me chuckle. This is a woman who wrote a poem about bananas and their eventual extinction that I always think about when I am grocery shopping, torn between conserving them, since they’ll soon be gone, and buying twice as many, because they’ll soon be gone.
But it made me think about the number of selfies I take. My phone serves as many things, including camera (which doubles as a pocket mirror), the device that tracks the miles I run and weight for the last few years, as well as my calendar, email, and actual phone. As a writer of personal essay, memoir, and this blog, as well as other writing forms, I really don’t want to indulge in any behaviors that seem even more self-centered. My phone contains thousands of photos — of my kids, husband, pets, amazing desserts or other food items, funny signs or other outrageous/noteworthy sights from my many errands around Los Angeles and other places I’ve traveled, and poignant, often Gothic images caught accidentally and through a Hipstamatic or Instagram filter. And there are a fair number of selfies — from days when I wondered if a new hairstyle made me look young and carefree, or like some sad, 21st century Mrs. Robinson. From evenings when I had to rush off to an event, or be onstage, and hoped that some objective measure (like a photograph) would convince me that I looked passable, not too tired or puffy or overly made up.
What was most disturbing when it came to photographs of myself were the surprise pictures from friends, sometimes posted on Facebook or sent in an email after an event. I have an image of myself that exists in my mind, and often in the last several years, the face that stares back at me from other people’s photos and my own selfies doesn’t match it. Like the idea of the “residual self image” in the movie “The Matrix,” my imagined face is idealized, me with ample sleep, natural makeup, frozen in time at perhaps the age of 32. I recently realized that it’s not the “age” on my face that bothers me — it’s the weight. My weight has fluctuated over the last decade, at an adult low about five years ago after a punishing and expensive (ultimately untenable) medical weight control regime, at a post-pregnant high about five and a half years ago, when having an infant, a toddler, and too many leftover plates of mac n cheese and Goldfish had caught up with me, 30 pounds more than I weigh now.
My selfies, I think, have been an attempt to measure in some semi-objective way, how different my actual face is compared to the way I imagine it. And it’s only been in the last few months, when I have come into better balance with eating and exercise, that the selfies look more like the face I imagine I have. It’s a long road. I recently edited a medical blog for a client about the “apple” and “pear” body types, with apple bodies having higher chances of heart disease, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome. I come from a long line of “apple” women, and I assumed I am and always will be an “apple.” Writing the post led me to input my own measurements into a WebMD calculator, where I was pleasantly surprised to learn that, according to BMI and waist size, my body shape now indicates that I am “healthy.” Seems like a more scientific approach than a bunch of selfies.
