In his notebook, George Orwell wrote, “At 50, everyone has the face he deserves.” The claim, in fact, is stronger than this: anyone at any age has the face that reveals “his soul.”

If one only knew that one was walking around with a naked face that bore one’s deepest character, one, no doubt, would be loathe to leave the house. The only reason this doesn’t seem to be the case is that most of us are not observant enough. So caught up are we in our own swirling thoughts that we overlook the faces that pass by, almost without notice.

This inadvertence goes to show something significant about the one who has failed to take notice. This is that such a one, despite protestations to the contrary, really doesn’t care.

For if one did care, then one would need to be very keen indeed. That face is in quiet agony; this one surfacing despair; that one attempting courage yet feeling unconvinced; this one feeling dreary for “he cometh not.”

To really care is to look closely and to feel deeply. Your face, near to me, is dear to me. I see more in it than you might like anyone to see, yet once you see that I see perhaps your face shall soften. I’d like for the darting 15-year-old eyes to pause, for the 80-year-old worry lines for fade some. To see is to care and to care is to love.

I’d like for each of us to forget his careworn face and to know his original, invisible one.