Stuck with a funny face

Growing up, I was that kid that liked to pull funny faces. It was just something I did all the time, something that most kids do. To be honest, it’s something I still do.

One day, my Mom told me, that if the wind blew while I was making a funny face, my face would get stuck that way. It might have been because my family was embarrassed to be seen with a child that always had a weird looking expression on their face, had their eyes crossed or had their tongue sticking out, but I became worried. What was I going to do? Making funny faces was my trade mark! It was my best way to make people laugh. It was like telling a soccer player they couldn’t play soccer anymore, because if they did, they might fall and die or something along those lines.

At first, I didn’t believe it. How could the wind possibly make my face change? There was just no logic behind it. So, I did what any other kid would do, and asked my friends (please note this was before the internet age, so I couldn’t google it). Surprisingly, my friends had heard the same thing, if my friends believed, I had too as well, you know the whole “if your friends jumped off a bridge would you?” Yeah, these were the days when I didn’t think for myself.

So, I stopped. I gave up making funny faces. Instead, I just smiled, every day, all the time. If I had to bet on it, I would have believed that the wind thing worked for smiling as well, because my face seemed to be stuck in a permanent smile. Those were the days. Anyway, moving on with my story, every time I saw someone with a funny looking face, I was mortified. I had thought that they looked that way all because of the wind, for the longest time, it’s what I believed.

When I grew up, I realized I was told this “legend,” because I could have been offensive to some people, and it was impolite and possibly rude. It also could have been because my parents were embarrassed to be seen with me, either way, the moral of the story is, if you’re going to make funny faces, don’t let your parents see.