Wrinkled Reflection

“Just say it,” you silently reminded yourself. You knew you’d regret it if you didn’t. After an hour of staring at your own reflection, like a train wreck, unable to look away, unable to speak the words, you finally retreated to the bedroom. As you collapsed on the bed, staring at the ceiling, you wondered how anyone could be as pitiful as you. A simple request. A simple action. Just the words, “I am beautiful,” into a mirror. You couldn’t do it. 

It shouldn’t be hard to say. “Ahhh-eeee eeeh-mmmm,” you quietly began, slowly rolling through the words as you let the air from the sound flow over each part of your tongue. “Buh-eeee-oooo-t-ay-ee-ff-uuuu-llll,” you finished, still staring at the ceiling. The words didn’t mean as much, or much of really anything when you spread them out like that. “They aren’t even really words,” you reasoned with yourself, “Just one sound following another. They don’t have to mean anything.” 

Deep down, you knew that isn’t what the exercise intended. The point was for you to say something nice to yourself. “Fake it, till you make it,” everyone always reminded you, but you’d been faking it so long, it seemed making it was no longer an option. Every time you looked in the mirror, the image seemed warped. Your face bloated, your eyes puffy, wrinkles building up at the edges, your whole body hunched in such a way that revealed all the extra pounds built from years of fast food and binge-watching. Every time you looked in the mirror, it reminded you of what a failure you’d become. 

It was such a stupid word anyway, beautiful. Not a word you even knew if you wanted to apply to you. Beautiful was such a feminine word, girlie almost. Feminine, girlie. When you were in school, people flung those words at you, sometimes to insult, sometimes as a bitting joke. Even when the intent was fine, the words still stung. Beautiful was too close for your liking, but handsome didn’t seem right either. You weren’t some ruggedly handsome individual with a strong jaw bone and bulging muscles, nor did you want to be. Not really. An old, half-dried marshmallow seemed to be a more appropriate visual comparison, but that comparison was more unfortunate than positive. Perhaps the loss for words was a failure of its own kind. Failure was a common theme for you. 

Once you were done with school, you were supposed to get a good job, get married, have some kids, buy a house. It all started with the job. It seemed like a good fit, work from home, stay on the phone, better pay than your friends, but as the world moved on, friends moved away for better jobs. They got the marriage, the house, the kids. You got screamed at by angry people on the phone. You tried to leave a few times, look for other work. No one seemed that interested though. Then again, you should have done more. It was your fault you were like this. If you had looked harder, been more like your old friends, you would have been fine. Someone would have hired you. Somewhere. 

“Ahhh,” you silently groaned. You were back in the cycle of the early evening. Try as you might, it always ended up like this. Staring in the mirror, collapsing into a spiral of thoughts about your own shortcomings. “I’m so dumb,” you reflected as you dove further into the rabbit hole of your own self-pity.

“You need to stop this,” you thought to yourself. That’s why you started reading those dumb articles anyway. It was such a waste of time, but at least it distracted you for a bit. You always did this. The same thing. You escaped to the endlessness of the internet, found a weird kick or another to help, but they never worked. You usually tried to follow the advice from here or there when you could, “But why bother?” You wondered. It was so much easier for you to just sit in bed, scrolling through pages online…. At least it was a good way to kill time. Maybe it was time wasted, but at least it passed more quickly.

“No,” you thought to yourself, “You are actually going to go to that mirror, and say it.” The thought still rang hallow, but slowly, you pulled yourself up and trudged over to the mirror.

As you stared at your reflection, you reviewed your image; the growing mid-section, puffily crinkled eyes, the bloated, sagging face. “When did I get neck wrinkles?” You wondered as you twisted your head, right, left, up, down. They seemed to grow larger by the minute. “Are these new?” Without thinking, your phone slid from your pocket to your hand. A flip through your photos revealed the wrinkles had been growing for quite some time. “This is why you hate photos,” you thought to yourself. They only ever made you feel worse. Blemishes, wrinkles, age and failure magnified tenfold and saved forever. But no matter how much you hated them, the occasional photo was a great reminder that you indeed, did still exist, time did pass, and they were great for telling you things like, yes, those neck wrinkles have been around awhile. 

“I am so pathetic,” you thought to yourself. Now that was something you figured you could actually say to the mirror. Sometimes when you stared in the mirror, it felt like there was a whole other person sharing the moment. Wrinkles and all, you felt less alone. In a weird way, it was like there was someone else looking back at you with the same tired eyes, the same new-old lines, same stupid neck wrinkles. It was like someone else understood how big of a disappointment everything turned out to be. If only you could say the words… 

“I am… bitter,” you said to your reflection. It was closer this time you supposed, more honest anyway. At least you actually said something out loud for once. It felt good. As you returned to your bed, you realized you still felt a bit better than before. You considered trying again the following day. Maybe there was something to this bunk after all.