Do What You Want

“Happy 3^rd Birthday Peightougn! Love Mom and Dad.” (Dramatization to protect the innocent.) When I see these signs, I have feelings. Shocking. I know.

I promptly overthink the situation and create “get off my lawn” aged-opinions. I’m of the opinion that the Taylee/Maylees of the world don’t benefit from marquis signs that they are unable to read wishing them a happy birthday. I’m thinking that’s an adult responding to some weird social pressure to proclaim they love their kid enough.

I could be completely wrong. Also, If Khyliegher’s parents had the sign made in the spirit of “I know that this is about my needs, not my kids” then I fully support them. It’s probably not a surprise that I subscribe to the school of thought that if you want attention, it’s okay to ask for it (in a prosocial way, obviously).

But I don’t think that’s what’s going on for the proud parents of Everlee.

“What’s your beef with marquis signs?” It’s not that at all.

Allow me to offer another example; back in the olden days, if a youngster wanted to ask someone to prom, it went as such; identify target, conduct reconnaissance to learn if they’ve been asked, muster up the courage, likely grew a huge zit leading up to the moment, then just ask.

Then along came social media. (The irony is not lost on me that I’m using social media to complain about social media).

Pinterest, Instagram, platforms I’m not too old or uncool to know about; all of them accidentally created a situation where response to your action became more important than the action itself. Kids were no longer able to just use their creaky voice to ask a girl to prom. They have to conduct a prom-posal. And they have to document that prom-posal and hope for things like the right number of likes or that it’s not too similar to Billy’s prom-posal.

Many situations have experienced increased pressure to PR it all up. This week, a fucking forest fire was started because of pyrotechnics from a gender reveal party. Currently 13,712 acres burned. I’m sure the folks who started it feel horrible. They probably just wanted the announcement of whether there’s a penis or vagina headed out to “trend.” Or maybe to get just a few more likes than the reveal that Kynlee’s parents did.

But naw. They started a forest fire. A new bar has been set. How are the virtual Jones’ going to keep up with that? Gender reveal earthquake? Gender reveal swarm of locusts?

Someone who’s reading this may be planning their own gender reveal extravaganza or over-worded blog about the amazing-ness of their 2 sons right now. If that’s what you want to do, do it! If it’s what you think you have to do, fucking stop.

Social media is not the boss of you. You don’t need to prove anything to anyone. You do love your kids enough.

We can’t make social media go away. And I’m not sure we should. But we should remember that it’s a tool at our disposal. Not the other way around.

PS Follow me for more stories and pictures of the Life and Times of Dhaneell and Diertee (bwah ha!!!!)