Let the Record Show... Not Slow

So this is me.

   Now, as I'm sure most of you are doing, I too look at this picture and see a well-adjusted, mentally sufficient young man wearing a kickass WALL*E shirt, about to enjoy an amazing smore on the beach. However, I also realize that there are those of you out there who may look at this and jump to the hasty conclusion that you are looking at a retarded boy with a stick in his mouth and a pirate fascination. Regardless of how likely or unlikely the existence of such a preoccupation with piracy may be, the more serious presumption of a hypothetical handicap is in fact what happened for a time when I used this as a profile picture.

   Since this was back when I wasn't in the habit of checking my profile all that often to see what people were writing to me and about me and I didn't have many other pictures of myself up, I was completely unaware of developments when friends of mine from elementary school began to comment and discuss the issue of me being a retard among themselves, eventually as a point of fact. All without anyone asking me what the deal was or waiting for my response.

   In a few short weeks of innocent internet negligence on my part, this picture would no longer simply be the object of speculation as to my mental state but rather it would become a tragic symbol of pity. When I finally logged back in, before I could even sort out what was going on, I had to read through a couple of very confusing "I'm so sorry(s)..." and other similar messages from people who were telling me that it was "so cool" that I was still living my life and going to school and congratulating me for doing very little. While I normally don't mind people who are almost strangers showering me with unmerited adoration, it was a tad bit difficult to just veg out and soak it up when my admirers thought of me as a vegetable. 

   After a good stint of deletion, diplomatic yet forceful (and intentionally well worded) private messages, and just general damage control, I had finally set the record straight. There was even a rumor (those apparently fly as facts for this bunch) about how I had become mentally handicapped in the first place. Evidently, I was in a very severe car crash and suffered a nasty case of brain trauma. When did eating smores and taking embarrassing photos become the hallmark of the diagnostic criteria for condemning someone to mental retardation? 

   Apparently a Pixar shirt and a ball cap are just as incriminating as a mug shot. I don't understand how it was easier for these people to read between the lines of this picture to find such an implication, when the truth is so much more obvious and plausible: I'm immature, easily amused, and really like smores. (A-duh!) Juvenile? Yes. Retarded? Not quite. Super delicious? Hell yes.

  

   Then again, I can't exactly blame them for thinking something had to have gone horribly wrong for the Jason they knew to end up like this. You see, despite the fact that I was just as immature when they saw me on a regular basis in elementary school, I managed to wrap that eccentricity in a much more palatable package.

 

 Just look at him! I mean, he's got more buttons on his shirt than he does teeth in his mouth. Plus he's sitting in a rocking chair, which everyone knows is where you sit when you're wise and know things you want to share. Clearly, smaller Jason is on top of his game and not only defying claims of retardation by his very presence, but he's outright impressing people and looking snazzy doing it. Then there's older Jason. Wow. No words. Not because there are none, but because his mouth is full and we wouldn't want him to choke.

   Understandably so, there was some cause for alarm when my former elementary school peers saw their view of me change from the left to the right so abruptly, but to assume such a change be possible only with accompanying brain damage is still a lot to swallow. Despite the numerous observable differences between the two such as how many liters of hair gel is on each of their heads, the amount of pigmentation in their faces, the number of eyes they appear to have, and their levels of self-awareness I still can't help but feel a little saddened by the fact that I have let myself go so dramatically that not only have I ceased to be adorable, but I can be mistaken for retarded at a glance. These are only superficial factors though. The really important changes I've undergone can be shown in these graphs.

    The following graphs were extrapolated by the man in the eyepatch from a page of random crayon squiggles drawn by the boy in the tie. Seriously.

   

   

   

   As would be expected, I grew very rapidly in the beginning of my life and as a young child, then leveled off and had various growth spurts during the time of my adolescence before reaching a very gradual level of growth at my current age. As for the changes in smore love, I needed my teeth to grow in before I could properly appreciate them. The intelligence spike at the beginning of my life came with the territory as I learned how to read and started watching Star Trek, but the large drop which occurred more recently is the result of me stumbling upon this...

WARNING: CLICK ONLY IF YOU HAVE BRAIN CELLS TO SPARE 

   Neither were really that high to begin with.

  

    This makes me sad. There used to be a ton of  things I could think to do with those things. I mean they're stretchy and rubbery, who can't amuse themselves with something like that? I am definitely going to start looking into Balloon Animal Husbandry to expand my current prophylactic repertoire.

By the way, if "Balloon Animal Husbandry" hasn't yet been a puzzle on Wheel of Fortune's Before and After category, it needs to be.