In the grand human conversation, mirrors and reflections represent at least a couple of facets of the human psyche. For poor Narcissus gazing in his pool or the woman of Sylvia Plath's poem, a mirror is vanity and obsession with the superficial. Other times, as in Disney's Mulan, reflections express self-awareness and the disconnection between one's personal self-conception and the image they display to others, and Rowling's "Mirror of Erised" brings the innermost desires of its viewers to light.
I sometimes have the experience of looking into a mirror after being engaged in something else - a book, the internet, a conversation - and feeling somehow surprised at what I see. The face I see stares back in equal surprise, its eyes widening a moment, as if I had temporarily forgotten what I looked like. Seeing myself again centers me, in a way. Oh, I whisper, I am really a person.
As I contemplated the excision of mirrors from my daily routine, I wondered, not without apprehension, what effect this would have on me. Without my reflection, forever reminding me of my humanity, would I forget it?
I began by brushing my teeth in total darkness. A quick shower, turning my back to the mirror as I exited the bathroom, and I was ready to begin my day. I dressed for work: slacks, a button-down. And wondering how I could possibly knot it without a mirror, I decided to forego the tie.
Kate and I had agreed that, due to safety concerns, car mirrors were acceptable, as long as I did not employ them to gaze upon my own dear visage. So with a final sweep of my hair, hoping it lay in a seemly arrangement, I climbed into the car and drove to school.
Stepping out into the dark parking lot at 6:35am, I shut the door only to see a face staring back at me. I jumped in surprise and averted my eyes from the reflection in the car window. I hurried into school and pretended it hadn't happened.
Avoiding my reflection, however, proved more difficult than I had at first expected. Throughout the day several windows, my blank computer screen, and a momentary lapse of planning upon exiting the bathroom all bombarded me with their reflections of my image. It surprised me how present my reflection seemed to be. I normally take little notice.
I made it through the day, however, without, at least, any prolonged gazing. Returning home, I wondered, did I feel different?
On the whole, no. And really, I still could see quite a bit of my body without the aid of any reflection. My hands, sense of touch, and feet planted below me all play a role in self awareness, and although I admittedly hadn't read anything particularly thrilling or disturbing that day, my sense of self remained nevertheless intact.
Skyping with Kate about our experiences, I learned that hers was very similar to mine. She too found it a dickens of a time trying to avoid her reflection which, as she works with computers, I can see might be everywhere! She also told me she'd experienced much of the same apprehension about her appearance in the morning, though because she takes public transportation to work, she hadn't had to worry about car mirrors.
And so I wonder, what is our reflection to us? At the end of the day, I didn't feel I had much to add to the conversation. Perhaps, however, I can now add this: mirrors are our simplest way of imagining ourselves in the 3rd-person. Looking into the glass, we try to imagine ourselves the way we are seen by others so that we might gain control over their perceptions, their opinions, and, ultimately, our social status. This seems an evolutionary advantage, and yet when presented here, the mirror seems to carry some of the vanity it has reflected in literature for millennia.
But to see ourselves in the third person is also, perhaps, a way to gain a distance and perspective that the view along our noses can't provide. It reminds us, perhaps, that we are not so different from the other people we see each day third-person, and that their first person lives might be as significant and deep as ours.
love always, Kate & Jimmy
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