I have seen so many Roman statues during my visits to museums that I really didn't relish visiting yet another gallery of Roman antiquities when I recently visited the Getty Museum at Malibu, California. Still, I was there and had time so I roamed among the various artifacts trying to find something that was unique enough to be truly interesting to me. There were drinking vessels, soldiers' helmets, spear tips, short swords, jewelry made from gold and precious stones and the requisite marble statues and busts. Of course, the quality of the items in this museum was superb and the setting of the museum perched on the Pacific coast was exquisite, but I felt that I had seen it all before.....until I happened on the marble carving above. I knew the profile immediately because I had been looking at all of my adult life when I looked into my bathroom mirror. 

     Suddenly I knew that, when people called me a blockhead, there was a historical significance to it. Had I only known I could have said, "Of course, I am a Roman."

     Strange what you can find in a museum, even when you are there reluctantly.