This morning I had to quickly get some passport pictures taken for a security pass. It was one of those “retake your pose again and again and again until you are happy” machines, so I thought I was safe - though I should have remembered the cardinal rules of photo-me booths: the customer will:

a) never be happy and
b) will always look like a pale, lopsided, spotty, fat, bad-haired version of themselves.

Nevertheless…

Pose One: Ok, here we go. Hmmm. Pretty OK, but everyone knows you can never use the first pose. That’s like running on the first ball. The next hit might be way better. And that kind of logic would explain exactly why I’m not destined for a baseball career. So I click next.

Pose Two: Meg looks a little pale, and one eye is definitely bigger than the other. Screw that.

Pose Three: Hang on a minute, with my hair pinned back I look really weird. Next.

Pose Four: Now there’s too much hair, dammit. And I swear that eye is waaaaay smaller than the other one. I try opening it more to compensate. I look like Popeye. Bugger.

Pose Five: What if I just….<click>…Eh? Wha? My photos will be outside shortly? Whatthe…? Hmmm

So I got the photos. One hand is in my hair, the other somewhere around my chin. I look surprised and unhappy. I look like morning. I look just like one of the desaparecidos. So all we have to do now is dig out a black frock for my mum, hang a blown up version of this startled and somewhat grainy pic around her neck, with the words “Donde est� mi ni�a?” scrawled across the bottom and teach her to dance the cueca sola outside the Presidents’ Palace in Santiago, circa 1975.

Alternatively, I could just go get some more taken. But I don’t think I can handle the emotional turmoil.