Photo Opportunity
© 1995 Annemarie Bogar Atchison
Marriage, birth, divorce, and death. All major life events with indelible emotional effects. However, I submit there are few moments which inflict more lasting impact and trauma on our lives than School Picture Day.
I consider this event solely responsible for an adult's fear of cameras. And the foundation is built at such a tender age, probably around the sixth or seventh grade. Can you imagine a worse time? Those are the years when we're beginning to care about how we look to ourselves and others. Oh sure, the experience begins innocently enough. Friday afternoon, just before the final bell rings, your teach announces that next Monday student photos will be taken in the school cafetorium. Free plastic combs for everyone!
Later that night, after supper is over you tell your mom about School Picture Day. "Oh wonderful!" she says. "All your relatives have been asking for a new snapshot of you."
Hmmmm. Not exactly the response you were looking for. You'd hoped she'd whisk you off to the mall to buy you a new ensemble. Instead, she takes you to the drugstore and buys a home permanent. Something with super curling power. "Now you'll look extra glamorous," she says.
You spend Monday morning trying, for the one hundredth time, to get a brush through your hair. You stare at your reflection in the bathroom mirror and try to decide you resemble more: Albert Einstein or Don King.
"Maybe you should try the dog's brush," your little brother offers.
"You look just like a Cosmo cover girl," mom says. "Now leave your hair alone, no one will notice that it's a little puffy. Besides, you have lovely eyes and a nice smile."
"She oughta have a nice smile after all the money we've paid to that damn orthodontist," dad says.
"You have WAY BIG hair," bratty brother whispers in your ear.
"SHUT UP!" you shriek. Your life is over.
In homeroom that morning everyone is staring at you. You can feel their eyes on your hair. You want to say to them, "Take a picture, it'll last longer!" but then you remember that is precisely what is about to happen. Your likeness, such as it is, Einstein or King, is about to be preserved for all eternity. Your life is over.
The bell rings, signifying the end of homeroom, and your teacher begins herding everyone toward the cafetorium. You and your hair wait quietly in the single-file line while the minutes crawl by. Suddenly.you're up! You sit on the photographer's stool and try one more time to pull your free plastic comb through your hair. Several of the teeth break. "Eyes up here, young lady," the photographer says. SNAP! In one five-hundredth of a second it's over. You realize it was at that precise moment the left side of your face began involuntary muscle spasms. Your life is over.
If you have ever hated anything in your whole it's the day the pictures come back from the photographer. You dread looking inside the package but you must find out if the photos are keepers or if they should be destroyed in a freak accident on your way home from school. Luck is not with you on this day.
"Aaaagh! that's not my real face! That's not my real hair!" your inner self wails. "What's wrong with my eyes? I look like Cujo!" You wonder if you can talk your parents into moving to another continent. Then you notice half the class is admiring the photos of a kid whose pctures always turn out great. You hate her, too. Your head falls to the desktop in despair.
"What's wrong?" the nerdy guy in the seat behind you asks.
"The photographer failed to capture my essence - the wonder that is me," you answer.
"Yeah, me too," he says.
Against your better judgment you take the pictures home anyway. You know you have to because your mother paid for them. And what does she say when you hand her an eight-by-ten which looks like it was snapped by Larry, Mo, and Curly rather than Francesco Scavullo? the only thing a mom would say,
"Oh honey, you look beautiful."
Salt Water Taffy
© 1995 Annemarie Bogar Atchison
One of my co-workers returned to work today after spending a week at the beach with her family. Before she arrived at the office I asked the rest of our staff, "How much do you want to bet she comes in here carrying a box of saltwater taffy?"
What is it that compels people to return from the beach with a box of this stuff? The only thing lower on the food chain is a yellow marshmallow chick.
It don't care if it's called Original, Authentic, Homemade, or Ye Olde Fashioned - I'm somewhat skeptical about a taffy's claims to be indigenous to any coastal region. I think it's all made in Detroit.
DON'T THEY KNOW WE HATE IT?
It sticks to our expensive dental work and we can never unwrap a piece without some of the paper becoming embedded in the candy. Yeah, and the pretty pieces always taste the worst.
It's the type of treat we find glued to the inside of the candy dishes in our grandparents' homes. That nice couple from the church brought them a box from Atlantic City in '66. Gram said Grampa would rather have had fudge because it helps keep him regular.
Do our friends truly believe taffy is the best way to compensate us, the non-vacationers, for missing out on sand, surf, and fresh seafood?
I don't know, maybe I'm overlooking the Higher Purpose of saltwater taffy. Is it supposed to be the grand poopah of all souvenirs? Am I wrong in thinking it will never take the place of something made from spanish moss or a pet hermit crab with "I (insert red heart here) Myrtle Beach" painted on its shell? I don't think so.
Oh sure, as the fortunate recipients of saltwater taffy we oooh and ahhh and thank our friends very much for remembering us while they were away. We open the box right there and then. We search for a piece with peanut butter in the middle, unwrap it, toss the paper back in the box, and pop the confection in our mouths. "Mmmm," we say, nodding in the gift-giver'sdirection, "Delicious! It's been a long time."
But admit it, while we're singing rhapsodies of false joy while discreetly trying to separate our molars with our tongues, our tiny, tiny minds are thinking: "TAFFY? Gee, thanks. The in-laws are coming for a visit next week and I was looking for a way to shut them up. TAFFY? What a chintzy gift. You were gone for ten days and this is the best you could do? I'll bet you wore yourself out driving to and from every Wings store on Kings Highway to find the perfect box of discounted candy.
"THIS IS WHAT OUR RELATIONSHIP MEANS TO YOU? You see a piece of taffy and you think of me? Fine. I'm going to the mountains soon and I'd like to bring you a souvenir. Just a little something to show I was thinking of about you while I was away and that I value our friendship. How about a corn cob toilet paper holder?"
|
