FACE VALUE

If a picture says a thousand words then every photograph of me is an interminable insult. Honest. In my entire life, there are maybe one or two photographs in which I don't look like either a sociopath or a blithering idiot. Even my first stint in front of the camera yielded disappointing results: There I am, a newborn with one eye swollen shut, an indication that my first action in this world was impertinent enough (I don't remember -- maybe I flipped off the obstetrician) to warrant a slug from the doctor. That pretty much set the tone for subsequent photos.

It's not like I haven't taken corrective measures. But they only seem to make things worse. Attempts at smiling warmly became a pervert's leer. Trying to pull off a wry and knowing smile has made me look like a con man smirking after he's made off with the funds for widows and orphans. Subdued smiles make me look sullen, and just about everything else makes me look half-witted.

The final straw for me, the photo that almost made me decide to start wearing man-burkhas, was this head shot. It has been used for a little less than a year as an ad for this blog. I have no idea what effect I was hoping for, but I'm guessing I was trying for a wry, enigmatic smile. Looks like I failed.



But perhaps things would have worked better if I had sought inspiration from the great masters. If I wanted an enigmatic smile, I ought to have imitated the most famous one in the world. Like thisI don't know about you, but I'm already seeing an improvement. I guess it's all about presentation. That sneer by itself screams for a lead pipe to the face. But maybe it becomes more tolerable in a different setting. Why, it might even be pardonable if it were something biblical ...

On second thought, better not try this one. In the original, Adam is looking longingly toward Eve, whom the Almighty has His left arm around. In this case, my face introduces the smirk of a frat boy about to get some and then write a letter that begins "Dear Penthouse Forum, I live in a small, divinely created paradise in the South ..." No, the smirk needs a different home.

I've always been something of an Anglophile and something of a snob, and I like to flatter myself by imagining that I could slip seamlessly into the British aristocracy of the Belle Epoque. So perhaps I should call upon my inner aristocrat:

But this is Middle Georgia, simpler place with more straightforward manners and values than a bunch of poncy toffs. Perhaps I need to show that I am a salt-of-the-earth, man-of-the-soil type:
Or maybe not. There's no backbone of America in that image! There's no homespun virtue! I have the smug look of a farmer who's getting away with cultivating 100 acres of marijuana. And just look at the blank expression of the woman. Looks like she's been into the harvest up to her elbows. If that image had a sequel, it would be me being handcuffed and thrown in a squad car.

Well, let's see. America does love celebrities and we enthralled by the wonder of Hollywood maybe a little borrowed glamour is what I need.

Ah, now that's more like it! Dashing, heroic, erotic. So what if it snaps credibility in two! So what if every woman I've ever dated is bent double with laughter upon seeing this! I tell ya, that's an image that should go up on billboards up and down Interstate 75, hawking this blog! It just needs mass gullibility to succeed!

Or I could do this: Pull a Sinatra, and deck every photographer I see trying to take my picture. Maybe that would be best for me. And you.

The graphics in this blog item are the work of Karen Ludwig