Our looks and how we are perceived/how we perceive ourselves is important. And placing importance on how we look/come across is a fundamental human trait (whether it's attractiveness, status, culture, health...).
A friend sent me a funny poem about an old woman that keeps leaping in front of her whenever she looks in a mirror but I can't find it but Rose Mula's 'A Very Weird Thing Has Happened' has similar sentiments:-
A strange old lady has moved into my house! I have no idea who she is, where she came from, or how she got in. I certainly did not invite her. All I know is that one day she wasn't there and the next day she was!
She is a very clever old lady. She manages to keep out of sight for the most part, but whenever I pass a mirror, I catch a glimpse of her. And whenever I look in the mirror directly, to check my appearance, there she is, hogging the whole thing and completely obliterating my gorgeous face and body! This is very rude. I have tried screaming at her to stop it but she just screams back, grimacing horribly. She is really quite frightening!
If she insists on hanging around, the least she could do is offer to pay a little rent. But, no! Every once in a while, I do find a dollar bill stuck into a coat pocket, or some loose change under the sofa cushion, but that is not nearly enough.
In fact, I don't want to jump to conclusions, but I think she is stealing money from me! I go to the ATM and withdraw one hundred dollars, and a few days later it is all gone! I certainly don't spend money that fast, so I can only conclude that the old lady is pilfering from me. You would think she would use some of that money to buy some wrinkle cream! God knows she needs it!
And money isn't the only thing I think she is taking. Food seems to disappear at an alarming rate, too. Especially the good stuff like ice cream, cookies and candy. I just can't seem to keep that stuff in the house anymore. She must really have a sweet tooth, but she better watch it because she is really packing on the pounds! I think she realizes that and to make herself feel better, she is tampering with my scale to make me think that I am putting on weight too!
For an old lady, she really is quite childish though. She likes to play these really nasty games like going into my closet when I'm not home and altering my clothes so that they don't fit. Or, messing with my files and papers so that I can't find them. This is particularly annoying since I am an extremely neat and organized person. She fiddles with my VCR to make it not record what I have carefully and correctly programmed it to record.
She has found imaginative other ways to annoy me. She gets to my mail, newspapers and magazines before I do and somehow blurs the print so badly that I can't see it. And she has done something really sinister to the volume controls on my TV, radio and telephone so that all I hear are mumbles and whispers!
She has done other things like make my stairs steeper, my vacuum cleaner heavier, and all my knobs and faucets harder to turn. She even made my bed higher so that getting in to and out of it is a real challenge. Furthermore, she gets to my groceries before I get them put away and applies super glue to the lids, making it almost impossible for me to open them. Is this any way to repay my hospitality?
I don't even get any respite at night because more than once, her snoring has awakened me. It is very unattractive! And as if there weren't bad enough, she is no longer confining her tactics to the house. She has found a way to sneak into my car and follow me everywhere I go!
She has completely taken the fun out of shopping for clothes. When I try something on, she tries on the same exact outfit and stands in front of the dressing room mirror and monopolizes it. She looks totally ridiculous in the outfit and she keeps me from seeing how great it looks on me!
Just when I thought she couldn't get any meaner, she proved me wrong.
She came with me to get my driver's license picture taken and just as the camera shutter clicked, she jumped right in front of me! Who is going to believe that the picture of that old lady is ME?!