It’s pretty sad that the camera does not lie

ELEANOR GOGGIN

There’s a very nice photo on my mantelpiece of myself and two of my former flatmates. It was taken many years ago and if I might say so myself we all look coy and beguiling. And quite pretty. The husband of one of said same flatmates endeavoured recently to recreate that photo and the ensuing ‘retake’ was not nearly so beguiling. In fact it’s vile. Of me anyway and, after all, that’s all we all tend to focus on. The dimples of bygone days have been replaced by craters.

But I have a very flattering blurry picture of myself, taken not so long ago, on my phone. And I love it. I use it as my profile for whatever social media site I’m on. Including Scrabble. It proves I’m delusional. And yet another Scrabble lunatic surfaced the other day with a preliminary, “Hi, how’s your day Miss Ellie?” Far too familiar. And then a comment on the blurry photo “Wow you’re stunning”. Now I have to admit I texted my thanks with a demure and pitifully coy look on my face, which of course he couldn’t see. And then he started becoming very brazen telling me he had had two unsuccessful marriages and was now on his third which wasn’t working out either and inquiring as to my marital status. Now I’m not sure where any of these people are, so I lied through my teeth and told him I was happily married. “Ah now is that the truth?” came the reply. “I’ve checked you out on Facebook, do you want to private message.” Now it wasn’t the fact that he might be a potential stalker that upset me. No it was the fact that he now had access to photos on Facebook that other people have tagged me in. Photos of me caught unawares with no forewarning to hold in my stomach, put on my posing face or dodge behind someone’s back. Vile photos that I don’t know how to remove. Pride definitely comes before a fall.