smiling's my favorite

There are 53 facial muscles. I'm sure you've heard that it takes more of those muscles to frown than it does to smile. And I'm sure that you've heard many different versions attributing different amounts of muscles it takes for either. Believe it or not, however, the whole theory is unsubstantiated. Some experts even suggest that it takes more muscles to smile than frown. I am no expert and I will not pretend to know the truth about this topic. Instead, I would like to focus on another aspect of smiling and frowning: I have recently come to believe that more people are capable of smiling than frowning. Let me explain why I have come to this conclusion. I love to smile! It's my favorite! It's one of many things that Buddy the Elf and I have in common. Despite the fact that I usually don't smile in pictures, I actually love to do it. And more importantly, I am capable of it. I can curl the corners of my lips upwards. Frowning, on the other hand, I'm not so fond of. I don't like to do it. It's not my favorite! And recently I discovered something interesting about frowning...I can't do it. I am physically incapable of frowning! Now, clearly I can be sad, but I cannot make the corners of my lips go down to make a frown. I realized this one day when Polly was being goofy and made a frown. It looked weird to me. I couldn't recall seeing anyone actually frown. So, naturally I tried it myself. Complete failure. I looked goofy trying. This made me wonder, "Is it abnormal that I cannot frown?" As I do with most puzzling questions in my life, I put it to a test. I began randomly asking friends and family to frown, with Polly often offering a demonstration. Of all the people I asked, my mother was the only other person capable of doing it. Most people, I discovered, could not frown. I found this odd, as I had never really thought about it before. I also found it interesting that Polly said it hurt to hold her face in a frown. This was probably due to nothing more than the fact that she doesn't use some of the specific muscles it takes to frown very often. Maybe that's why some people think it takes more muscles (because it hurts more). So who knows how many muscles it takes for either. What I do know now is that I can't frown. Which is fine with me because, after all, smiling is my favorite!