IF YOU have been following me on Facebook or Instagram, you would have seen in the last few days, maybe the last few weeks, my smiling face plastered all over the place.
If you cared as much to read the comments, you would also have read how people say that my smiles are contagious.
How they love them.
How the smiles give them good vibes.
How fresh I look.
***
They are all correct.
I feel I have been taking photos of me smiling since New Year, since Christmas even.
And these smiles are great smiles, if I say so myself.
They’re happy.
They’re confident.
But mostly, they’re happy.
***
I’m talking about photos of me taken by somebody else.
Not selfies.
They could be taken by the waitress at a coffee shop.
By school girls I stop somewhere.
By a friend who is equally obsessed with her own photos.
***
I know my smile.
I do great vibes poses.
But especially when the photos are taken by strangers.
I teach them how to take better photos (portrait mode to keep things easy).
And I watch out, I look for their smile while they take my photo.
***
If my photographer smiles or approximates my smiles before she clicks, I win.
My new year’s resolution: to make at least one person smile everyday.
Naively, when I made it on New Year’s Day, I thought I was going to photograph people, and ask them to smile.
That will surely make my quota.
***
Then, I wanted to smile myself.
I wanted to document my happy and contented life.
I started posting more photos of me smiling.
The more positive responses I got, the more I wanted to smile for the camera.
If people say my smiles are contagious, I imagine them smiling when they look at my photos smiling.
Then, I saw a few people smile as they take my photos.
***
I like that word “contagious”.
I really hope that people get good vibes when they see my photos smiling.
Or at least, when they see me on the iPhone camera screen smiling.
Again, and again, people comment and ‘heart’ my smile on social media.
That makes me happy.
If that is not a great reason to smile the next time the camera is aimed at me, I don’t know what else to think about sad people in the world.
***
My smiling doesn’t mean that I do not have any care in the world.
As even the wealthiest people will tell you, our concerns are different from the poor people, but we do have problems.
As for me, I do not dwell on problems.
I just let my money work for me. Haha!
***
Early on, I have decided to be remembered for my smiles.
My creative friends want to explore other moods.
Like editorial photography, journalistic.
They want to present me in my unaware moments, unposed.
I question this line of thinking.
Why? Why not pose me?
Why not me smiling for the camera?
***
Some social media influencers are said to take 3,000 shots to find one perfect photo for the day.
Why not settle for my one smiling photo for the day?
I know my angles.
I know my photographic strengths.
***
I am a full frontal smiler.
My profile is not as grand as the other beauties and hotties of the world.
Get me to face the camera, get me to smile for the camera, and I can have a fair fighting chance.
***
Really, as far as photos are concerned, I’m not really up for drama.
I do not care for “story” in my face.
I just want a happy smile.
A contagious smile.
Let my words bring on the story.
But my face is reserved for smiles.
I’m not perfect, but my imperfect smiles are perfect for what I want.
For what story I need to tell the world./PN
