A Mirror Without a Face

I noticed it for the first time this morning. I prefer to sleep until eight o'clock, but my bladder is an early riser, so I was up at six whether I preferred it or not. It takes my eyes several minutes in the morning to clear out the fog, so at first I didn't think much about the fact that my face was missing in the mirror. Once the fog had cleared, I could see the wild hair, ears sticking out through the wilderness, and the flabby neck hanging down and overlapping my yellow robe. But where were my long dark eyelashes and my thick brown eyebrows and the youthful hue of my skin and my rosy plump lips? I saw them in the mirror just yesterday, or did I?

Years ago when I was a young girl, my elderly aunt told me this day would come. She didn't have a face--well, she did, but it was one bland color and it all ran together--and she said, "I just don't want you to grow old and be shocked one day when you wake up to find your face gone." While I played connect the dots on her arms, she would tell me stories about how the aging body works. She told me it was nature's way for eyebrows to turn white and disappear, eyelashes too thin, lips to shrivel up, and the rosy hue of youthful skin to fade. "Growing old is all part of life," my aunt said, "and so is losing your face."

So there I was this morning at six o'clock, standing in front of a mirror without a face. Well, it was there but it was one bland color and it all ran together. My aunt may have been right about nature and the aging process, but I'm not happy about it. Not happy at all.

A Mirror Without a Face

 I hate this aging thing. I want my face back.