My Brother’s Face

This story is contributed by my husband Doug.  Do you look like your sibling? - Mary

My Brother’s Face

When my brother and I are together, people sometimes say, “You can sure tell that you’re brothers!”  Thing is – I don’t look anything like my brother.  His complexion is pale and ruddy—my skin has a slight greenish tinge.  His hair is black and curly—mine is medium-brown and sometimes wavy.  But, of course, we are both gray now.  His nose has a downward bend with teardrop nostrils—mine is straight with nostrils round.  He is narrow-shouldered, straight, and wiry—I’m broad-shouldered, short-legged, and top-heavy.  

I can think of two explanations for this so-called resemblance.  (1) There is an underlying similarity in our facial structure that I’ve never detected or understood but that other people see.  (2) And this is a little bit far-out – but I like it, so bear with me – our expressions, body language, and attitudes are similar because we share a family culture, and, over time, this has helped form our facial expressions in a similar direction. What do you think?

This gets me thinking about faces.  Do you own your own face?  Are you responsible for it?  Or is it assigned to you?  If so, in parts or in whole cloth?  Looking at the photos from the 1910s of my grandmother’s large family, I am struck by how different they all appear to me.  Despite coming from a fairly small, intermarrying, Pennsylvania community for several generations, the diversity of looks is striking.  My great-grandmother’s round face and my great-grandfather’s long face (and they were second cousins) are distributed among their children, but very direct resemblances are few.  

Then I looked through a family history book.  There, staring directly at the camera from, probably 1860 or 1870, was my 3G Grandmother, Margaret.  But it is my own grandmother, Margaret’s great-granddaughter that I see looking back at me distinctly in every feature – eyes, nose, mouth, expression, and attitude, though a hundred years separate them.  And when I see the photograph of my grandfather’s Aunt Mary, it is my own aunt that I see, down to the square shape of the face, slightly bulging eyes, protruding lower lip and, maybe the attitude. 

In my Dad’s photo collection, I found a close-up of my G Grandfather, Henry, that I’d never seen before and showing his real face.  I noticed that it was very distinctive face, handsome in a strange sort of way and, well, alien. But what struck me most is that none of his sons or daughters or grandsons or granddaughters look anything like him.  And neither does anyone else that I know. Is he a reprise of features 3 generations before? Will he appear again?  Or just his chin?

Back to my brother.  There is a photograph of him standing next to my maternal grandmother at the Corvallis, Oregon airport.  They are both looking up and off into the distance.  They both have the pale ruddy complexion, the slightly bent nose with teardrop nostrils, the benign and slightly amused expression.  Dead ringer.

-Doug

Doug is on the left and his brother Donn on the right (Donn is 17 months older than Doug)