Fake Family Crisis #1: You are 14: It's School Picture Day and you have a huge pimple... Remember being 14? Remember School Picture Day?  ----- I remember it like yesterday but there have been, rounding up, approximately 10,220 yesterdays since I personally lived through this particular "crisis." ----- And while I now long for the halcyon days of youth when I had such relatively little things to worry about, back then I recall that School Picture Day didn't seem like such a "little thing" to be worrying about. Not at all. A picture may capture you for one brief moment in time but it also, unflinchingly, preserves you forever and for all to see. ----- If this question is provocative, it might be because it gets to one of the biggest issues affecting human kind: aesthetics and self-image. ----- I'll go out on a limb as an untrained, uncertified psychologist to say how one looks has a big impact on one's self-image. And what matters most is not how others perceive you (although that, too, matters) but how one regards one's own self. I know incredibly aesthetically attractive people who don't feel attractive at all. I also know some very, how do I say this... "aesthetically challenged" folk who feel extremely attractive and to a considerable degree have become extremely attractive to others because of how they feel about themselves. ----- It's a matter of beauty on both the outside and on the inside and it's a difficult thing to teach out children. It's hard enough for us to even remember it... ----- So for a 14-year-old, a huge pimple can ruin a day. And for a 14-year-old on School Picture Day, it can ruin their life (or at least it at the time). Heck. Even without the blemish it's hard enough knowing how to handle the situation: should I smile or look cool? Should I get a haircut? What should I wear? Add in a big and beastly blemish (not asked for, not controllable, not attractive no matter how zen one is) the world unwinds. ----- How does one reasonably resolve this one? While there's no one way (there's rarely just one way) I can think of several possible options 1. The George Harrison Approach: show up, smile and know that this too will pass. 2. The Technologist's Ploy: take the picture use Adobe Photoshop to remove all/any imperfections. 3. Game the System: feign sickness to stay home from school that day and get it taken at a later date. ----- If it were my kid, I'd push very hard for option 1 but knowing my daughters as well as (I think) I do, mom would (and will once our children are old enough to actually get pimples) push for option 2 or 3. ----- What would you do?