In my line of work I talk to people on the phone a lot. Whether I want it or not, my mind creates a certain mental image of a person on the other end of the line. Over the years of conversing with people I may find out about their families, children, what they eat, where they live, how much child support they pay and how they spend their vacations. No matter how much I know about a person, the voice is what creates the mental image. For a long time I was talking to a lady with the sexiest, youngest, most innocent voice you can imagine (talking about work stuff that is). When it turned out that she worked for the company for over 30 years, the mental image was ruined.
It’s somewhat different with blogging. Bits and pieces of information, or a photo of an eye, hair color or an ear or whatever other body and/or face part the blogger chooses to share coupled with a certain tone of the writer still being processed into some sort of a mental image. I hope your mental image of me is one of a fat schmuck who is annoying and boring to tears. You will have an easy time picking me out of the crowd. Outside of my unimpressive case, 10 times out of ten all the mental images are wrong. People you don’t see usually do not look like Fabio or Cindy Crawford. They are more like Ralph Kramden and … lets leave the female mental images alone.
Anyway, today I was rubbing shoulders with the local intelligentsia at the promotional event for a recent book by the Waiter of the Waiter Rant. The Waiter spoke about his experiences and his book. He wasn’t bad, but my mental image of him was ruined. His blog has a tone of sadness and some hard-earned wisdom, while he looks like a 40-year old shlemazel who is still waiting tables at this age. While I liked the presentation I couldn’t shake the impression that this is not who I expected to see. I had a camera, but I didn’t even feel like taking his picture. There was another guy who was name-dropping during the Q&A part. I hope it wasn’t one Charles Ferruzza, because my mental image of him is on the left and he certainly didn’t look like that.
I left disappointed, swearing to fight off any further attempts to create images in my head based on incomplete information. On the way back I took some real photos of the Loneliest Dealership in Town.
9 responses so far ↓
1
tracy
// Aug 5, 2008 at 11:37 pm
Nope, Charles doesn’t look like that at all. Yes, he’s white, but that’s about it. Overall regular sized, not thin or pasty and Frenchish or with wire-rims like your cartoon, but sporting a healthy (not literally healthy, but figuratively and rather charmingly) food-critic belly. I don’t remember my mental image of him before we met — I don’t hang on to those. Real is real, and real is better. I did used to think TKC must be hot, based on the sexist crap his persona spews — sexist males must be sexy, right or else they’d be hypocrites? where does the mind get this junk … but when I saw him at an election forum once, the snack cake jokes made sense. For all you all know, that “photo” of me is fake, too.
2
midtown miscreant
// Aug 6, 2008 at 8:06 am
I listen to Farruzza on Walt Bodine when he is on. I picture him as portly and maybe gay, not that there is anything wrong with that. But he has the type of voice I often associate with a gay guy. He is a funny guy, so I imagine him as a Dom Deluise type.
3
Xavier Onassis
// Aug 6, 2008 at 9:26 am
And who doesn’t dream of being thought of as a “Dom Deluise type”?
High praise indeed.
4
Lynn
// Aug 6, 2008 at 9:40 am
I went to the Waiter Rant thingie too (thanks to you for informing me about it on your bolg, btw!) and was also struggling with my perceived image and the real one. I was prepared, however - I saw a picture of him online the other day.
I took a couple of shots and will post them later.
5
MoxieMamaKC
// Aug 6, 2008 at 10:26 am
This is funny. I absolutely hate meeting people that I’ve created a mental image for. I am always wrong. Always. REALLY wrong.
6 Order Up! | Sit. Stay. Good blog. // Aug 6, 2008 at 10:35 am
[...] (from who’s blog I found out about this event - thank you!) mentions today that her mental image of the Waiter didn’t mesh with the actual version of the Waiter. I [...]
7
m.v.
// Aug 6, 2008 at 2:23 pm
Moxie, you don’t want to know what my mental image of you looks like :-).
Tracy, do I have your photo? You didn’t leave a link. I have seen TKC, I am much better looking.
8
MoxieMamaKC
// Aug 6, 2008 at 7:55 pm
Yikes! Dumpy Hausfrau or MILF? It’s somewhere in between. Handsome says I look like Elisabeth Shue but with darker hair. That was 10 years ago and he needs glasses.
9
m.v.
// Aug 6, 2008 at 7:57 pm
I am not telling
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