Dorian Gray

Don't look in the wing-mirror of the taxi.

Well, at my age, it's probably never a good idea to look in a mirror. Certainly not when you're tired and drunk.

But - never, never look in the wing-mirror of your taxi home.

Because you will almost certainly be tired and drunk. And the light will be poor. And there are going to deep shadows across your face (what light there is coming from streetlights, high up). That mirror isn't likely to be very clean, which may make things even worse. And it's a magnifying mirror, which is apt to distort your features in most unflattering ways. And...... Just DON'T!

I happened to catch a glimpse of my face in the wing-mirror of a taxi a few nights ago, and I was shocked, appalled, horrified. Hooded eyes, coarse skin, wrinkles like canyons; everything pallid and puffy, bloated and sagging. Just horrible. I was uncomfortably reminded of the face of my elder brother, who did not age well (lost most of his hair in his early 20s, poor chap; and, with a mostly sedentary job and an excessive fondness for spending all his spare time in the pub, he began to pile on weight shortly after that: he looked 40+ before he'd reached 30). I have always liked to think that I am rather the reverse: that despite having passed the baleful threshold of 40, I can still usually pass for 30. But perhaps the years have finally caught up with me. Caught up with and overtaken.....

No, no, it's not that bad. Poor light. A slightly convex mirror. A long day and too much booze. As soon as I got home, I marched into the bathroom to check on my appearance and was reassured to find that, with decent lighting, I looked much younger and sexier, far less raddled and ravaged, considerably further from death's door..... than I had in that bloody taxi wing-mirror.