Mother's Day comes every Saturday for me. Unless she has something else planned or on the rare occasion that I have something else planned, I spend Saturday afternoons with my mother. She doesn't drive so I take her on errands -- to the grocery store, to the drug store, or she'll request that I pick up things from my end of town to bring her.
Last Saturday, I asked her to take a selfie with me. (She had taken her first selfie with my niece during sunrise service on Easter Sunday this year and I was a little bit jealous). So after she modeled what she was going to wear to church for me, we sat on her sofa and took our first selfie together.
Before I took the first photo, she commanded, "Don't get too close!" (with the camera, she meant)
"You're not all the way in the picture," she said.
"Mama, yes I am. What you see on the screen is how the picture will look."
"Oh, well can you move it back a little farther?" she asked.
"Mama, my arm can only extend so far."
Finally complying, she said, "Oh, okay."
I took several pictures. After viewing them, she had me delete more than half I ended up keeping two, which are essentially the same pose.
I emailed the pictures to my brother, who said in his best intentionally incorrect grammar: "You 'is' her." Translation: You look like Mama.
He went on and on about our similarities. This inspired me to find two identical dolls with complexions similar to ours and hair similar to mine. I planned to use one of the "
church hats" I purchased recently on the doll that would represent my mother. So her doll stand-in's hair would not matter since it would be covered.
Initially I was going to use two Barbie Basics but that would have required deboxing them and restyling Mini-me's hair.
 |
| The facial features of these two Barbie Basics dolls closely matches mine and my mother's, but I opted to use two other dolls to capture us in playscale form. |
Two Janay dolls were used. Their selfie is shown below followed by
the selfie I took of the people who inspired the Janay selfie.
 |
| Janay and Janay take a selfie similar to the one I took with my mother as seen below. |
 |
| My mother's first selfie with me, 05/03/14 -- she's dressed to impress and I am dressed for comfort. We are so much alike yet so very different. |
Next, I asked her to allow me take a photo of her alone. Since I didn't have to take a close-up shot, she readily complied.
****
To all the mother's reading this: Happy Mother's Day! Enjoy your "selfies."
♥
dbg
I am a Black-doll enthusiast, doll historian, freelance writer, author of The Definitive Guide to Collecting Black Dolls; Black Dolls: A Comprehensive Guide to Celebrating, Collecting, and Experiencing the Passion; and The Doll Blogs: When Dolls Speak, I Listen. 
*These circa 1970s drawings, signed by Larry Wooden, were unframed when a cousin gave them to my mother during the 1970s. She (the cousin) purchased them from the artist on an NYC street. My mother later re-gifted them to me during the 1990s. 
