Move-in day 2017. My dad rented this huge Escalade/Suburban thing and it was filled to the tippy top with all my stuff from home and my storage unit. After getting in everything, which took forever, we went to Target to pick up some of the last minute essentials, like shampoo, laundry detergent, a mirror. And that’s where this story begins, with that damn mirror. 

It’s a standard mirror from Target, the “Room Essential” brand. It’s probably in the dorm rooms of thousands of college students across the country. There is literally nothing special about this mirror. Probably a foot and a half by four(ish) feet? Plain black frame, hooks to go over the closet door. This mirror shouldn’t be anything special, and it surely shouldn’t cause any problems, but here we are, nearly six months later, and I am suffering.

 My roommate, Hannah, has a similar mirror, but this one has a green frame (I think?). But the way our room is, Hannah’s closet and mirror are in a nook near the window. My closet, however, right in the middle of our room, so my mirror is accessible to both of us.

 Back in the beginning of the year, my mirror made us look really in shape. I mean, the way my calves looked in that mirror could have made me a leg model. We loved the way we looked in my mirror, so much that we believed the mirror was distorted. To add to this belief was the fact that Hannah’s mirror made us look really hefty, and let’s face it, with all the body insecurities instigated by the media these days, it’s easy to understand why we thought we truly looked like the people in Hannah’s mirror.

 Then one December night, when I was getting ready to go to a ski-themed party, we had the revelation that we should put the mirrors next to each other to find out which one was real. After 20 minutes of staring ourselves and taking comparison pictures, we came to the AMAZING conclusion that MY mirror, the mirror that made us look good, was the accurate reflection! Wow, we were so excited. Finally, we could feel good about ourselves and our bodies and just radiate confidence, right?

 WRONG.

 Maybe two days after this amazing news, something weird began to happen. We were both in bed late at night when this noise just started coming from somewhere below (my bed is lofted 6 feet). I was FREAKING OUT. All I could think was that it was a bug, or worse, a rodent. Like, maybe Shelby had risen from the dead to haunt me in college for using her untimely death as a way to make friends in school. It happened again the next night, and my anxiousness was peaking.

 The third night it happened, Hannah got out of bed to investigate. It was coming from closer to my side of the room, so she checked the fridge, the microwave, under my desk. Finally, she went to check my closet. That’s when we solved the mystery. It was so cold in our room that the mirror was bending to become convex! The creepy noise we were hearing was the mirror transforming. And, of course, this change in the mirror changed the image we now see in it. Our once “magical” mirror now distorts us to look wide and hefty, just like Hannah’s mirror did.

 Now I have no idea what I look like. The mirror in the bathroom only shows hips up, and it poses great inconvenience to walk to the bathroom every time I try something on. Not to be dramatic or anything, but instead of being either insecure or confident, I sit at a place of being completely unsure of what I look like, absolutely clueless.

 Thanks Target.

In conclusion, for anyone going away to college, moving into a new apartment, or looking for a new mirror, I highly recommend looking for a mirror with a heavy set frame that will prevent it from bending, or maybe see if there’s a weather proof one (is that a thing? I don’t know, but after this incident it should be). Happy shopping!