ozymandias

Yesterday Jenn was going through some old photos online and found a few of us from 14 years ago. I obviously looked much younger then, different from how I look now, and seeing my old self made me uncomfortable. It was like the old me in the picture wasn’t me at all.

Isn’t that weird? I was shocked at my reaction, at my preference for my older, grizzled visage (I think it’s because I’m more familiar now with my current face than my face from 14 years ago). But I was also shocked that I would see an old pic of myself and feel so disconnected from the old me. It was kind of a disassociative experience.

I wonder if this is very common. I don’t think I’ve heard people talk about this before. I feel like the usual story is you see old pics of yourself and go “dang, I was so much younger and better looking then, I really let myself go,” yada yada. And I’m not saying I wasn’t more youthful or attractive then, just that I’m more familiar with the current me, like it more because of that, and feel weird when I see old pics of myself now. Anyway, now I’m going to start asking friends if they’ve ever experienced this too.

I was definitely slimmer back then though, I’ll give my old self that. Lived leaner then, cheaper. I’ve been working on that lately though, getting back to living a bit leaner, and it’s going well. Just need to remember that too many cookies and full sweetness bubble teas catch up with me if I don’t moderate my intake of that stuff.