Maybe this is just more solipsistic projection, but we all spend a lot of time alone with our reflections, and here, in the kagami-no-ma, is where we are most naked and most vulnerable to our own self-love and self-loathing. The mirror room is where, every day, we confront our hopes and desires, our delusions and disappointments, our aging and our mortality, and there's something sweet and sad and incredibly brave about our willingness to do so. We put on our makeup and our mirror faces. We suck in our cheeks, and lift our chins, and turn our heads to better deflect the light and shadows. We greet our mothers and fathers with affection or dismay. We engage in subterfuge and wishful thinking, but we keep coming back, every morning, and look ourselves in the eye and somehow pull ourselves together enough to get out the door and face another day. This, in itself, is kind of heroic.
But let's not get carried away. Let's not be misled. Because, after all is said and done, all we really know is this: our eyes are horizontal and our noses are vertical. Just this.