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Consider This

By LC Van Savage

Heads, Dimples, Eyes and Egos


Not that anyone’s ever asked, but it appears to me there is a direct correlation between certain body parts we humans have and our life’s pursuits. For example, have you ever noticed that many actors seem to have gigantic heads? Take a good look next time you view some Thespian activity. I think you’ll agree that most of the actors involved have really big noggins. (Fred Astaire was one exception. He and John Caradine, (father of Grasshopper,) had really long, skinny heads. However, Astaire instead had huge hands. ) Look at Bette Midler and Bill Maher, Clark Gable, Rosie O’Donnell and George Segal to name just a few---all big-headed folks. And let us not forget one of the world’s greatest actors, Bill Clinton. Very large head, necessary to house a very big ego and extremely over-sized libido. So, does one have to have a large skull to be an actor? I really don’t know if it’s a criterion, but it sure seems to be the rule.


I have no idea if having a big head means a person is a good or bad actor or creative in any way at all, and I can’t really say that all creative types now cause me to gasp at the size of their cranium when we are introduced---OK, one artist in a gallery a couple of years ago, but I covered my astonishment by faking a coughing fit.


Dimples. You can be certain a person with matching dents on each cheek will appear to be divinely happy, right? That’s because they grin constantly. I guess they got so used to hearing as children that their dimples were adorable and cute that they found themselves forced into a role they may not have wanted to play forever, that of being terminally adorable and cute. Thus, they smile constantly and inappropriately to show off their darling facial deformity. I knew a woman once who was so personally enamoured by her prominent dimples she simply could never stop smiling and it eventually got to the point of everyone wanting to punch her lights out because she stood grinning maniacally as you told her the worst possible news.


“Edna, my home burned to the ground and we’re left with nothing. ” Response; “I’m so terribly sorry to hear of your tragic news. ”Grin. “Edna, our cat gakked up a furball the size of a pressure cooker right on my husband’s boss’s shoes just as I’d started to serve Cherries Jubilee last Saturday night. ” Response; “Terrible news dear, I’m so sorry, you must have been very upset. ”Enormous grin. Edna’s was not a nervous grin as most of us engage in from time to time. No, she was grinning because she’d always been told her dimples made her look sweet and cute, and as the habit became constant, she was unable to stop.


I remember a girl I knew who had really long eyelashes. From her youth, she’d been told about the stunning length and thickness of those lashes, and so every time she turned to look at someone, she jammed her eyes open impossibly wide and then batted the lashes really hard, like she was trying to shake something off them, just in case the viewer didn’t get it. It was some distracting, I can tell you.


And there’s one other physical trait we should never tell toddlers that makes them feel irresistible and superior; eyeballs. When a little girl, and it’s usually that brand of toddler, is told she has fabulous eyes, as she grows, she sometimes tries to keep them perpetually forced wide open. It becomes vital to that girl to make sure everyone is aware of her wondrous eyeballs. Doesn’t it hurt to force one’s eyes open that wide all the time? How can they keep that going? Don’t their eyes dry out? Do they do it all day long? I’d say yes, because in order to keep a habit going in public, you must practice continually in private. Sorry, but people who do that look like they have a thyroid condition suitable for Ripley’s “Believe It or Not,” or that they’re standing in a working wind tunnel. It just isn’t normal to see a half-inch of white around one’s irises. I don’t know about you, but peering into a person’s conjunctiva grosses me out. Well, that’s my take on these things. Just stuff I’ve noticed. I could be wrong.


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