One of the 10 auto/biographies I’d like to write is the autobiography of my reflection.
I live my life constantly, but my reflection only pops into being every now and then. I could write about any event in my life, but my reflection is only conscious of those moments when I’m looking at myself in a mirror, or can be glimpsed in someone else’s car window.
It would be a filtered life story, but – unlike in themed autobiographies – it might not have a coherent structure.
I do not spend long looking at myself in the mirror. I realised this in my last job, when someone would occasionally say (sarcastically, I imagine), “I like your hair today, Ben.” Suddenly feeling self-conscious, I would take the next opportunity to find a mirror, and realise that I was looking utterly ridiculous, my hair all over the place.
When we were decorating our house, about a year ago, I went into work one day oblivious to the fact that I had specks of white paint all over my glasses. I finally looked in the mirror at lunch time and discovered my error.
So my reflection might harbour feelings of jealousy. It’s attached to me in many ways – it cannot exist without me – and yet I show little interest in it. Does it share my feelings? Does it agree with my decisions? It has no choice – it cannot act, only copy.
To write the autobiography of my reflection would be an opportunity for me to explore the boundary between conventional autobiography and fiction. Like Duncan Brown’s self-portrait, it’d be a kind of third-person autobiography, necessarily conditioned by my own view of myself, and yet this narrative voice would not be my own.
My reflection might not like me. It might be hurt by the things I say and think about it, and might disapprove of the things I do. Or, it might be obsessively attached to me. It might crave my presence so I can bring it to life. Perhaps all of these things would be true.
My reflection cannot speak to me, so I must assume its voice, and imagine, rather than reveal, what its inner life is like.