I used to look like Robert Redford. Now I look like someone who ate Robert Redford.
It happened constantly when I was younger.
Strangers would stop me in the grocery store.
“Excuse me, sir. I hope you don’t mind my saying so, but you are the spitting image of Robert Redford.”
“Really?”
“Well, not young Robert Redford in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. More like Robert Redford in The Natural. You have a certain rugged, handsome quality.”
I would thank them graciously, sign an autograph, and continue shopping for canned peaches.
Sometimes people would approach me at the mall.
“Has anyone ever told you you resemble Brad Pitt?”
“Once or twice.”
“Not Brad Pitt in Thelma & Louise, of course. More like Brad Pitt in Ocean’s Eleven. You have his eyes. And something about your jaw.”
Naturally, I remained humble.
“Well, I appreciate your saying so. My jaw and I are delighted.”
I never saw the resemblance myself.
Personally, I always considered myself a cross between Johnny Carson and my Uncle Howard, the zookeeper, who himself resembled the love child of a baboon and a grizzly bear.
Uncle Howard was a handsome man by zookeeper standards. The animals respected him. Several female gorillas reportedly asked about his availability.
But those days are gone.
Now, as I enter my senior years, the celebrity comparisons have changed.
Last week, a woman approached me at the supermarket.
“Excuse me, sir. Has anyone ever told you you resemble Sally Struthers?”
“Sally Struthers?”
“Yes! But not Sally Struthers from All in the Family. More like Sally Struthers if she worked as a lunch lady in a retirement home and had been accused of stealing the pudding.”
I thanked her and abandoned my shopping cart.
Another gentleman approached me at the mall.
“Sir, I hope this doesn’t offend you, but you remind me of Jack Black.”
“Jack Black?”
“Yes. But imagine Jack Black joined the Beach Boys in 1974, got fired in 1976, and spent the next fifty years living in Brian Wilson’s basement, surviving on powdered donuts and expired Tang.”
“That’s quite specific.”
“Do you sing?”
“No.”
“Probably for the best.”
Recently, a woman stopped me outside a pharmacy.
“Excuse me. You resemble Harrison Ford.”
My heart soared.
“Really?”
“Yes, but Harrison Ford after being trapped inside a Home Depot overnight, surviving on beef jerky and drinking water from the garden hose.”
“Which movie?”
“Oh, no movie. I had a dream about it.”
Another woman insisted I resembled George Clooney.
“Not George Clooney in ER, mind you. More like George Clooney if he’d spent twenty years managing a struggling Long John Silver’s franchise outside Toledo.”
She paused.
“And the franchise had recently failed a health inspection.”
At least I was still being compared to movie stars.
But soon the comparisons took an alarming turn.
“Sir, has anyone told you you resemble Martha Stewart?”
“Martha Stewart?”
“Yes, if she’d escaped from prison by crawling through a sewer pipe and emerged wearing a bowling shirt.”
A man at the gas station said I resembled Elton John.
“Without the glasses?” I asked.
“No, without the money. Imagine Elton John working the overnight shift at a truck stop, selling scratch-off tickets and arguing with customers about the coffee.”
Another fellow approached me in the produce department.
“Excuse me, but you are the spitting image of Mick Jagger.”
“Well, thank you!”
“Not Mick Jagger today. Mick Jagger in another thirty years, after retiring from music to raise alpacas in West Virginia.”
“Alpacas?”
“He’s had a rough time with the alpacas.”
And now people don’t even bother comparing me to actual celebrities.
Last Tuesday, a woman tapped me on the shoulder.
“Excuse me, sir. You resemble my Uncle Frank.”
“Was Uncle Frank an actor?”
“No. He repaired septic tanks in rural Pennsylvania. Had a drinking problem. Lost three fingers in a dispute with a combine harvester.”
“Was he handsome?”
“Before the accident.”
Yesterday, a man approached me at Costco.
“Hey! Has anyone ever told you you resemble the guy on the oatmeal box?”
“Quaker Oats?”
“No, the generic oatmeal at Dollar General. The fellow who appears to have been drawn from memory by a police sketch artist suffering from heat exhaustion.”
This morning, a little boy pointed at me in the grocery store.
“Mommy! Mommy! It’s the man from the movie!”
Finally! Recognition!
His mother grabbed his arm.
“Don’t point, Tyler.”
“But Mommy! It’s him!”
I smiled.
“Which movie, young man?”
He studied me.
“Planet of the Apes.”
I stood there holding a bag of frozen peas.
“Which character?”
“The old one they kept in the cage.”
His mother apologized.
“He’s going through a phase.”
“So am I, apparently.”
I used to resemble Robert Redford.
Now I resemble a retired zoo animal whose former owner is being investigated by the Department of Agriculture.
And the worst part?
Yesterday, I passed a mirror in a department store and caught my reflection.
For one glorious second, I thought:
“Hey! There’s Robert Redford!”
But upon closer examination, I realized I was standing beside a cardboard display advertising orthopedic footwear.
The handsome fellow in the mirror was a photograph of an eighty-year-old man wearing compression socks.
I turned away.
And there, standing directly behind me, was Uncle Howard.
Except Uncle Howard died in 1997.
It was my reflection in another mirror.
I went home and ate a banana.
Without peeling it.
The family resemblance is getting stronger.
