(NOTE: This essay is from 2006. Since then, I’ve stopped looking.)
So, there are always a couple ways to read any article, and it’s not for me to direct that process for any readers who may choose to grace my site with a visit today or tomorrow.
Maybe this one is about aging. Maybe it’s about our views of ourselves as compared what others see in us (or don't). Or maybe it is about our emotional age. Or all the above or none of them.
Anyway, I notice every morning when I look in my bathroom mirror that, perhaps due to the lighting or the angle or the color scheme in that small room or some other factor I seem to look pretty good. It's like, "Dude, you're still okay."
That's nice enough, but later on when I return to my bedroom, a much larger room with different lighting, a different mirror and a different color scheme, I seem suddenly to look perfectly awful!
Who is that man and how did he age so rapidly walking from one end of his flat to the other?
Something similar happens at work between the elevator mirror and the one in the men's room. I'm not sure what I am looking for when I look in mirrors, but is most definitively is not to find out I have aged myself out of any definition of beauty altogether, because I still have my ego, you know.
Does this happen to everyone as we grow older? America is a place that celebrates youth, but we all grow older every day.
There is also the matter of the human mirrors we provide for each other, at any age. You don't have to have studied Jung to be aware that our Western concept of romantic love includes a strong element of falling in love with how another special person sees us.
What (s)he reflects back to you is intoxicating as any drug could ever be. Especially once somebody sees your inner beauty in a new way, that helps you feel valued and loved, it is like no other experience, and you are going to be hooked going forward.
Q: Mirror, mirror on the wall. Who is the most beautiful of all?
A: The one who thinks you are.
That is the essence of love. Turn away from him or her at your own peril. You may well find someone else, but the way our world works, you won't easily find that kind of love again.
Or, maybe that is just my mirror image talking. Nothing is simple, let alone the image that surprises us in the mirrors surrounding us. Especially the human mirrors. Each new one sees a new you.
LINKS:
U.S. border city calm as Title 42 lifts and asylum restrictions take effect (Reuters)
Florida federal judge’s border decision ‘very harmful,’ Mayorkas says (Politico)
With Pandemic Restrictions Lifted, Thousands Converge on Border (NYT)
Joe Biden's Approval Rating Among Republicans Is on the Rise (Newsweek)
What does a leaked Google memo reveal about the future of AI? (Economist)
How AI Knows Things No One Told It (Scientific American)
Google Unveils Plan to Demolish the Journalism Industry Using AI (Futurism)
‘Why would we employ people?’ Experts on five ways AI will change work (Guardian)
The open-source AI boom is built on Big Tech’s handouts. How long will it last? (MIT)
Meta announces generative AI features for advertisers (TechCrunch)
The likely winners of the generative AI gold rush (Financial Times)
Confessions of ChatGPT: ‘Interview’ with bot reveals fascinating, downright strange questions it’s often asked (Study Finds)
A foldable phone, new tablet and lots of AI: What Google unveiled at its big developer event (CNN)
Why do generative AI tools hallucinate? (Quartz)
A.I. will potentially impact 40% of your working hours, according to Accenture (Fortune)
Anthropic leapfrogs OpenAI with a chatbot that can read a novel in less than a minute (Verge)
Lyft Aims to Remove Travel Anxiety With Airport Pickup Feature (Gizmodo)
Trump's sexual assault verdict marks a rare moment of accountability. And women are noticing (AP)
Trump’s team revels in town hall victory as CNN staff rages at ‘spectacle of lies’ (Guardian)
CNN leadership under fire after ‘disastrous’ Trump town hall (WP)
GOP senators disavow Trump on debt ceiling, signaling growing rift (The Hill)
Yellen Says ‘We Have to Default’ on Something If Congress Fails (Bloomberg)
As House Republicans play politics on debt limit, Democrats take steps to keep our options open (The Hill)
Ukraine Presses Counterattack Around Bakhmut (WSJ)
Fake scientific papers are alarmingly common (Science)
Tucker Carlson Sends Startlingly Self-Aware Text Message To Journalist (HuffPost)
Harvesting The Sun: Afghan Man Builds Parabolic Solar Stoves By Hand (RFE)
El Niño forming quickly and could be "significant" event, NOAA finds (Axios)
Woman On First Date Feels Like She Could Spend Whole Life In Uncomfortable Silence With This Man (The Onion)
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