Decades back when television was yet to arrive and the radio was the only source of entertainment, I got hooked to the Voice of America. The host of the US radio station’s breakfast show always signed off with a call, “if you see someone without a smile, give them one of yours”. That had urged me ever since to look for faces that were not smiling, though I was choosy in giving them one of mine.
The very first joyous sign of recognition by a baby of its mother is its toothless, mesmerising smile at the sight of her. The smile may broaden if she appears with its feed. While exercising its hands and legs rhythmically, with gurgling noises, the smile the bundle of joy gives would be a prize given to motherhood. Pity, the poor father, the progenitor, is sidelined as an “also ran’’.
Researchers have found out that it takes more muscles to frown than to smile. I wonder how such a counting of muscles was done. Yet, many prefer to deploy more muscles to frown.
As per my humble research, there are men who are at ease with cares, worries, misfortunes and the like, but consider entertainment, enjoyment, amusement, or excitement to be flippant, transient and pedestrian. That life is a serious matter, not to be taken lightly, is their grim take.
Indeed there are smiles and smiles —wolfish, sardonic, mysterious, oily to mention a few. Understanding the meaning of such smiles is a challenge. Mona Lisa, the portrait by Italian painter Leonardo da Vinci, displayed in Paris at the Louvre Museum, is a classic example. The smile is enigmatic, with its “atmospheric illusionism”, whatever that means, contributing to the continued fascination of art lovers.
But the plastic smiles of airhostesses are transient that flash and vanish like the bioluminescence of fireflies.
However awe-inspiring a celebrity may be in stature, he should bow his head before his hairdresser. He should also, while sitting for his portrait or mugshot, obey the “smile please’’ command from the photographer, without waving it away.
Nothing is more difficult for the human subject than to flash a smile and hold it at such bidding. Whether an apology for a smile on the harsh features of a grumpy personality would be queasy is for the trigger-happy photographer to decide. The shutterbug, if aware of the Voice of America host’s call, may rather give one of his own instead of taking the risk of telling such a subject to smile.
J S Raghavan
Email: jsraghavan@yahoo.com