Famous Face

We were out recently and the bartender looked JUST LIKE Seth Greene. Seth Greene is a wee sprite of an actor, and I knew better than to automatically make the connection, out loud, for the bartender. In fact, the bartender was a bit surly, so I kept the whole thing to myself. At one point I even turned to JohnnyMac and told him. He agreed before saying "Don't tell him he looks like Seth Greene."

Ego. Its a fragile little kitten sometimes.

And I have learned very well by now not to tell someone who I think they look like, but rather to ask them instead if anyone has ever told them they look like someone famous.

For example. I once asked a girl who looked JUST like Reese Witherspoon if anyone had told her she looked like someone famous. She said Reese Witherspoon. See...spot on.

Another time, I asked a guy if anyone ever told him he looked like someone famous and he said Patrick Dempsey when I was thinking more along the lines of JohnnyDrama. So, it pays dividends and close calls from uncomfortable conversations when you ask first.

How do I know this? Experience.

During the onset of graduate school , I had very, very short hair. One day, a guy I had a huge crush on told me I looked just like Jamie Lee Curtis, who was on the cover of People Magazine that week. I swooned. Jamie Lee was a rockin' bad ass. He even bought a copy of the magazine and gave it to me. More swooning. I kept it for awhile

for a long time until I moved in with JohnnyMac. I liked the implication that I looked like Jamie Lee quite a bit.
About a year later, still with shortly cropped coiffure, I was at a party when another guy told me I looked just like someone famous. I smiled. Coyly. I had, after all, heard this before right? As I was smiling, all Smurky La Flirty McSmug style, he said, "Yes. You look just like Carol Burnette."
I am sorry. You must be speaking in tongues because Jamie Lee Curtis does not sound (OR LOOK) like Carol Burnette. Carol Burnette is a wonderful and talented woman. But not quite in the same category in my little mind as Jamie Lee.

Awwww....take that sassy.

And years later, when my locks were long long long, I was out on the town. While sipping my cocktail, a man told me I was a dead ringer for Sandra Bullock. What?
If you are trying to get into my fancy pants, this will never work is a good start.Months later, I had my hair straightened. I was feeling all big in my dance shoes when someone called me Alanis. And not 2009 looks like a supermodel Alanis either. This was very early 2000's when Alanis was angry. And salty. And bohemian. So I cut bangs into my hair. Months later, I went to NYC. And met a charming rogue. Who asked me in his charming roguish way, if I knew who I looked like. "Not a bohemian" was my reply.

He laughed. And said "Sandra Bullock."

What? If you are trying to get into my fancy pants, this will never work is a good start.

Oh, let's be honest. I don't look like Sandra Bullock. Oh no, but if someone wants to make that mistake twice, who am I to argue?

So the coup de grace occurs when I go to a party with a friend. The porch is full of people he knows so we start chatting with some of his old friends. And one of his old girlfriends says to me, "Do you know who you look like?"

I hope the answer is more Sandra Bullock than Screech at this point but its a crap shoot so I say, "No. Who?"

She says, "You look just like the girl from Mystic Pizza."

No. Not Julia.
No. Not Annabeth Gish.
The other one. The name of which I don't even fully know. The one in the hat.
The one who sang the crazy song about Joe in Say Anything. And for some reason, at that particular moment, I did not want to look like the nutty songstress in the Tiny Tim hat.

Ego. Its a fragile little kitten at times.

But, it helped me learn a lesson or perhaps I would have told the bartender he looked just like Seth Greene. And potentially (and unknowingly) spent the rest of the evening drinking dirty dish water in my cocktail.