Capistrano-Face

"Err..."
d blinked.
"Erm...wow. OK. Ermm..."
I smiled, nervously. The staff in the restaurant backed a little away from the crazy nervy smiley guy.
"Erm..." she said again. "What's happened to your face?"
I didn't know - as far as I could tell, it was my normal face, pretty much in the same place I'd left it last time I'd looked. I shrugged. She smiled.
"You have Capistrano-face," she said. Now it was my turn to blink. The words pushed me back through a me-shaped hole through time and space, and the universe did that thing where everybody walks backwards very fast, as time rewound itself through the years.

Seven years to be more or less precise.
Seven years ago, d and I were still, to use the old-fashioned term most appropriate to us, courting, and I went over to California to visit her and her pretty darned amazing friend, Annie. Annie was one of those people who, once you've met them, you know you're never going to meet anyone quite like them again. She lived a movie-script life - for better or worse, and the visit stands in our memories as a golden time - and not just because we didn't have Annie with us on the planet for very much longer once we'd been there. While there, we visited the mission at San Juan Capistrano (home of the famous swallows), and d took what she's always said was her favourite picture of me. I looked...well, pretty fat actually, but, by the standards of what came later, not so bad at all.

The universe ground to a screeching halt, then sped up again, zzzzhhhhooooming me back to tonight.
"Oh," I said, smiling less nervously. The waitresses breathed a sigh of relief and approached our table.
"That's cool," I grinned. Those who were here for the "My Body Is A Tardis" entry will understand why this rocks so much. While there're no turning back the years of being alive (and hey, I've been married for six of those seven years, why would I want to?), but there is a sort of way of turning back my body-clock, to look at least vaguely like I did at a different, younger age.

So...yay for Capistrano-face. Of course, it probably didn't help that we then enjoyed a hefty, gorgeous Chinese meal. So - just time to report that yesterday's blood was 5.2, and today's was 4.7, before I get my Capistrano-ass on the bike and try to push back to being someone d's never actually met. Now that'll be freaky! If I turn up at a restaurant one night and sit down at our table and d goes "Who the Hell are you?" I'll have made some real progress!!