Me and my brother John in 1980.
We’re having a baby photo contest at work, and it’s amazing to me how many people don’t have a baby picture of themselves at age 5 or younger. Actually, it’s kind of sad. Some lost them while immigrating or in a fire, and some just can’t find them in their cluttered, hoarder-like homes.
“After we had our first child, we took tons of pictures of her and handed them out to everyone; friends, family,” said Denise Butler, a woman I met at a park recently. “When the second and third children came – pretty much right after each other – well, we sort of didn’t have time to take pictures anymore. So we don’t have very many pictures of the younger children when they were small.”
I get it, the not having time to go all-out paparazzi on your kids. But then I see some of my mom and dad friends on Facebook.com, and that’s all I see, baby pictures. Pictures of Joey eating a snail; oh look, Suzie is going potty; Jimmie lost his tooth in his mashed potatoes … and on and on and on. I feel sometimes like all I read about online is what my friends’ kids are doing and not so much of what’s going on with my friends.
By the way, if you are one of those people who posts EVERYTHING about your kid on Facebook, I’m sure a lot of your friends find it annoying. Your kids are part of your life, not everything. When we treat the kid like he or she is THE most important thing in the world, guess what? That kid is not going to have a realistic view of the world when he or she goes out in it and finds out that not everyone agrees with you how great and special your kid is. If I am your friend on Facebook, I want to read about you. If you occasionally pepper your post with crap your family does, then that’s great. But the ones who constantly post what Jimmy and Johnny do all day long and the funny things they say, not so much.
