I’ve known you all my life, and I’ve always been very fond of you. Well, mostly always. I’m not very happy with you now and that’s why it’s time we have a little chat. Quite frankly, I’ve been putting this off long enough, and I do appreciate everything you’ve done for me in the past, so don’t think I’m going to enjoy this.

Ahem. You need to shape up. You’re a little too loose these days. I liked you better when you were wound up tighter. It’s like you used to care but now you just let it all hang out in the wind. I think you’re not even trying anymore.

I’m looking at you, face.

You’ve changed before, I know. Those early versions weren’t your best work, I think we can agree on that, but even if they were disproportionate, and used way too much skin on the cheek parts, there still seemed to be an art to it, a plan, a roadmap.

I also have to hand it to you, you’re brave–very brave. Just as I had got accustomed to the bigger model, with less cheek, and more jaw – which also tested well among young females – you added those red spots in the most visible places.

Sure, it might have worked – in some other universe, maybe. They didn’t turn into the sort of fireworks you had planned, did they? Popping off at the wrong places and at the wrong times.

Well, fortunately, that was just some weird 80s fad, and didn’t last, because I have to say that in the next ten years you produced your best work. The lips, the cheekbones, the jaw, all good stuff. Adding the hair was really a nice touch. Pure genius.

Now, let’s be honest here for a second. Let me remind you that it wasn’t all just your doing, I did have some good ideas, too. Like throwing myself in front of that hockey puck which gave me the big lip. Even if it didn’t last, it was an innovation. I can’t take credit for the scar on my forehead, but neither can you. The ninja star hitting me there was pure serendipity.

But we became a good team. I knew how to work you. If I lifted my head just so, and did that think with my cheeks, in the right light, we looked good.

I couldn’t have been happier with you. During those ten years when you really hit your stride, even with the changes, you always got better, and I could see where you were going with your plan. Each new version was better than the previous one – except for that fat face – and each new version made me forget about the previous one. I remember sometimes looking at photos of older versions of you, and I’d shake my head and smile. You were so silly in the beginning.

Then you went overboard again. I didn’t mind the little wrinkles around my eyes, but what’s this flesh hanging under my chin? Bags under my eyes? Another weird joke, I suppose. And the new color. Grey? I hate it. What’s with the ever growing nose? Seriously, my nose is bigger than ever before. You keep adding to the nose, you never go back, and it’s too big now. You should have quit while you were ahead.

Also, that never-ending forehead? Not a big fan. I know it’s been all the rage, but it’s a little too radical for my taste.

In short, I feel like you’re turning me into something else. Or somebody else. At first I was happy, and excited. When I saw the slightly wider jawline, I thought maybe I’d be like the 1990s Brad Pitt, or the 1960s Marlon Brando, or – I didn’t even have the guts to dream this dream, really – the 1950s Paul Newman. But I would have settled for less. Like my father. Even my grandmother, a handsome woman as she was.

But not this. At the rate things are going, in a year or two, I’ll be like Gollum.

However, I remain an optimist. I don’t think it’s too late to change back.

I think we can turn things around but we have to work together so can you please drop your attitude, and stop mooning me? That is beyond rude. It makes me suspect that you’re trying to go back to one of the early versions, that baby phase – pun intended – and I don’t appreciate it.

Let it be known that I would moon you back but, unfortunately, I’m not that flexible anymore. But if you don’t change your attitude and stop that, you can be sure I’ll be having a little chat with Hips, Groins, Back, and Knees, and then you’ll see what that feels like.

I hope it won’t come to that.