Man, My Sides Hurt
I’m not sure what to make of all of this. I was looking at Elie (our 2-year-old daughter) the other day. I smiled. She smiled back. I got to thinking about smiling. What a strange way to contort the face, and yet there’s something so inviting and attractive about a smile. It’s the shape our mouths make when we laugh – when we really, naturally, spontaneously laugh. I have in my wallet our family photo from our pictorial directory and the photographer told Lori and I to just smile and wait for the moment that he would snap the picture – HIS concern was to get the girls to smile. So, Lori and I sat with these smiles pasted on our faces, he would act goofy, the girls would laugh and, voila, they’re SMILING. It’s a beautiful picture. I love it. But smiling. What a weird thing to do. You’ve heard the “it takes more muscles to frown than to smile” or some such nonsense (here’s one take on the whole debate that might be worth a quick peek – http://www.snopes.com/science/smile.asp ). Smiling j...