It’s picture day at my kids’ school. And picture day makes me cranky.

Maybe it started when I was a kid, when our whole class was warned against playing too hard during recess for fear of getting dirty and sweaty.

Maybe it’s the memory of strangers trying to comb the tangles out of my waist-length hair with a cheap plastic comb, or force loose strands back into failing french braids. Or maybe it’s the uncomfortable contortions we were forced to hold, a smile plastered on our faces.

It probably has something to do with that truly horrible portrait from eight grade, and the hated stink of hairspray my mom had laquered onto my head. She was looking out for her nerdy daughter’s best interests, but even in the Eighties, I knew big hair was a bad idea.

I don’t like picture day any better as an adult.

Fussing with kids who REALLY want to wear that Pokemon shirt.

Realizing you should have gotten their hair trimmed a couple weeks ago.

Paying too much money for boring, awkward pictures that you’re just going to hide in a drawer.

And then there were those years we couldn’t afford to spend money on portrait packages, but how do you explain to your kids that you don’t WANT those cheesy, bland-tastic pictures of their precious faces?

Now is the part where I should insert some pithy spiritual insight about image, or where we get our identity, or whether we’re candid and honest about our walk with Christ, or living lives that rememble “school pictures”–affecting a fake, smily spirituality for watching eyes.

But really, I just wanted to whine about picture day.