I read a familiar story about Mariah Carey this week.
It said she wanted to go on the Wendy Williams show, and her people requested/ insisted that Wendy give up her usual side of the set so Mariah could sit there and show the better side of her face.
She’s been doing this for years.
I always thought it was crazy, and in fact thought anyone who said, “wait, wait, get my good side” when posing for a picture was a fool. Who has a good side and a bad side? Who’d ever notice?
Well, it turns out I do. Either Mariah’s not crazy, or we both are, because, yes:
I, too, have a good side and a bad side.
A young, firm-jawline side and an old, jowly side. A happy side and a sad-sack, “nothing goes my way” side.
The sides of my face used to match OK.
Then around age 40, that magic number, they started to form separate personalities and looks, like most identical twins eventually do. Now, even if both sides of my face dress alike, you can tell them apart. They can no longer switch names and fool their teachers.
How different are they?
If they were best friends and went to a bar, guys would hit on good side and only talk to bad side to ask, “Is your friend single?”
If they were baby spiders, their mother would eat bad side and let good side stick around to grow up.
If they were TV shows, good side would be Breaking Bad and bad side would be the test of the emergency broadcast system screeching over Weather on the Ones. Or NBC’s Smash. Season 2, not even season 1.
This is how I see it. It’s not like anyone would stare and point on the street and say, “Dayum, check out lopsided lady!” But it’s pronounced enough that pictures taken from the bad side are never good. I even turn away from bad side in the bathroom mirror. I try to love her but she yells, “LOOK AWAY! LOOK AWAY!”
And here’s the thing…
I’m being interviewed on my friend Marie Forleo’s web show, Marie TV today.
In my little corner of the internet, it’s a big deal. Last person she interviewed was Tony Robbins!
Uh huh. And guess which side they’ll be shooting?
Go on, guess.
Oh you know it. Bad Side. I feel it’s worth pointing out now, not so that when it airs in the Spring you notice it more, but so that you give me credit for being better looking than the person who’s sitting in my chair.
So maybe I’m just as nuts as Mariah Carey.
Except I’m not asking Marie to switch sides, because sane people don’t do that. Also, I don’t leave my fans waiting in the cold for three hours at Rockefeller Center, another thing she did this week. And I never ran around the set of Total Request Live with an ice cream cart in 2001, having a real-time meltdown on MTV. Oh, she crazy.
Now you.
Do you have a good side and bad side?
Something about your looks that freaks you out and other people swear they don’t notice, but you think they’re lying?
TELL ME IN THE COMMENTS.
I am so excited to see you on Marie TV!!! You an your bad side rock Laura. I love your posts, even if I don’t comment, I read them all, late…i seem to rebel against sticking to a schedule. I would wait 3 hours outside Rockafeller center for you. After all with Bruce, Lane, your mom (you would make your mom wait outside? Apparently in my fantasy here…) your dad, and all your blog followers, I would be entertained with such wit, such hilarity, I would be well pleased.
For your web designer, who clearly is brilliant, can the “Replies to my comments be set once and be done? I always post forgetting to re-select the above because my brain thinks I should set it once and be done forever more for all future post comments. Can you tell my brain does not work like a programmers?
Your writing is the best, I can’t wait for your TV show that you will write!
Jul’s, you’re hysterical! I think between the two of us, we should plan a Laura Belgray blog follower meet-up of some kind. It has to be in some pseudo-swanky (actually, seedy) NYC lounge. Dark lighting, so we all look fantastic and lots of drinks flowing, so we’re all brilliant and funny.
I see it happening.
And…bummer. But the replies to comments do have to be set each time. I already asked Laura. (great minds think alike)
Jul’s, I’m looking into the comments thing! I miss my old comment system. Seeing what we can do. As for that Rockerfeller Center or seedy bar meet-up, come dressed as your favorite blog post!
Holy Mother of God! I’ve got to figure out how to make a 250 lb scrotum costume!!
Forget this bad side stuff, you’re going to be on MARIE TV! Woo hoo!
That’s big time, Laura. You might as well be on Oprah. Marie is the Oprah of the internet.
I can’t wait to see it. It’s hard to believe they shoot that far in advance, but hey, it’s a top quality production, so I wouldn’t doubt it.
You know what else I’m realizing… you’re going to get some serious traffic to this blog, which means all of us are going to be famous too! 😉
Hey, we need to think of something big to set up your blog before the massive crowd arrives.
Maybe a few posts before the big day we all promise to comment like crazy and invite all our friends to comment so you’ll look super popular for all Marie’s gang.
(I’m laughing to myself because you probably already are, but I feel like one of your posse.) Actually, you’ll probably get so famous that you’ll be ruined and all your close friends will leave you. Maybe not 🙂
Or, we could all just tell you how wonderful you are in the comments (wait, done that.)
I’m sure you’ve got plans.
Anyway, congratulations! We’re here to help. Let’s clean up the living room, get rid of those boxes of magazines, and pull down your Patrick Swayze posters, we’ve got company!
Whoopsie. If there’s about to be a shitload of traffic on here, I better clean up my language!
Nobody clean up anything! Y’all stay exactly the way you are. I only want traffic that likes the word fuck, and shitfuck, and motherfuckinshit, and patrick swayze posters. If they don’t, they can be motherfuckin’ swayze.
I heart you.
Excited for the episode! What will you be wearing. Hair. Will there be bff banter and all that fun stuff.
Sadly half my comment disappeared!
It’s bff-style copy banter. A whole new genre.
After considerable thought (ie, nanoseconds) I’ve concluded that my good side is on the inside, buried somewhere deep underneath decades of living – eating too much and exercising too little. The bad side, of course, is what’s on the outside. If I could just turn myself inside out, I’d look fabulous…or perhaps gross, in a fabulous sort of way.
That’d be so slimy. I wonder if you were turned inside out, if the pockets would come out, too – spilling coins and lint.
Can’t wait to see you on MarieTV. I will squint my eyes a bit so you’ll look all soft and perfect whichever side is forward. You could do a weird thing where you look away and show your good side and talk back at her from the the corner of your mouth. It might make you look brilliant and eccentric (but flawless). Probably just full on crazy.
I love reading your words so I’m excited to see how it is to hear the words come out of your mouth on camera.
I have trained myself to ever so slightly lift my left eyebrow and the corner of the right side of my mouth to undo the strange lopsided effects of gravity. Oh you’ll love 51.
I spent much of my youth staring at myself in the mirror (as a fledgling actor) and moving each muscle of my face independently. I can still do it. Now I do it with my whole body as a Pilates teacher!
I spent years of my life gross masticating and doing wacky mouth and face exercises (mostly in my car on the way to auditions) to prepare for my job as a voice over actor. I haven’t done that for about 15 years and my face shows it. I need to get back to that job!
I already know how I’ll feel about 51, which is why I’m trying to make the most of 45.
I subscribed to some face yoga newsletter for a while, thinking I’d give that a shot. I tried one of the exercises, then let the emails pile up in my inbox – a key that I’m willing to do whatever it takes to stay young-looking as long as it doesn’t take effort. That should work.
I personally cannot overcome the need to make the goofy face every time I have a photo taken. As a result the only decent photos are candid. (And OK, even then they are mostly goofy.) In photography school, one of our projects was to take a straight-on photo of a classmate, then split it down the middle and flip and combine the two sides to make a left and right. Seriously….two different people, one attractive and the other not so much, didn’t matter how great looking that person was. This little experiment will def let you know what your good side is 🙂
Love your blog Laura 🙂
Fascinating! I’d love to do that to my own face. Make it 2 right sides. The 2 left sides, I don’t want to see, ever.
I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t have a good side. It’s a crap shoot. It seems like everyone I know, knows their good side.
My face, on the other hand, apparently has multiple personalities and decides at a moment’s notice which side to put forth. I guess my face has quite the sense of humor. Because she always seems to show the side that makes me think, “Really? I thought I looked a little better than that!?
Also, kudos to you for getting in front of the camera. That is my literal nightmare.
And kudos to Marie for holding her ground. I’m assuming that you got your shitty angle because she wanted her good side shot. But, it’s her show, so there you go.
Can’t wait to see the interview, good side or bad.
There was no ground to hold! I never asked to switch sides, because I’m NOT Mariah Carey.
Your unpredictable face probably makes you a lot easier in front of the camera. You don’t scream, “No! Not that angle!” at the poor person trying to get the shot.
My face is pretty extrememly unsymmetrical, so you’d THINK I have a good side and bad side, but I really can’t tell the difference. Or maybe I just don’t care.
Maybe they’re both good sides, just different. Like Cyndi Crawford on one side, Christy Turlington on the other. And yes, those are the last models whose names I knew. I guess there’s Giselle, but I couldn’t think of anyone to pair her with.
My eyes look different–they are different sizes. Well, the eyes aren’t different but the eyelids and area above are different shapes. No one to my knowledge has noticed it. It always scares me when I notice it. A few weeks ago when I let someone try out a de-aging device on my face, I thought it would be a total scam, but for 2 days, the left side of my face looked 5-10 years younger than my right. You’re supposed to do it on the whole face but they did just one side so you could compare. You could buy it and do it on just the one side…
Please DO tell me about this anti-aging product! If you’re only using it on half your face, maybe we should split it. What product was it? You know I’m a product ho.
Laura, I just love you (and the other side of your face) so hard. In a good way. But really, really hard. Having worked in front of AND behind the camera… OMG, I so feel ya, see ya, smell ya! (Also in a good way.)
I’m gonna be chuckling over this all dang day. Snort!
Oh, I’ll bet you know ALL about bad sides. More than you ever wanted to. Love you back (hard). xo
Definitely have a good side and a bad side, and in certain company, I have no qualms with demanding to switch to my good side before a photo. Besides, you can’t see my face on bad side, because for the past 5 years I’ve carefully trained my hair to cover most of it. So now I have good side and Cousin It. Problem solved.
I’ve now seen you almost in person, and I can report that if you have a bad side, it’s VERY well hidden. From the front you’re symmetrical and divine, gurl.
Ha! Thank you.