Brendan plays the cello for one reason and one reason only. The cute little girl in his class plays the cello. We’re pretty sure that if she had chosen a different instrument that would be the one Brendan would have chosen as well. Given that Brendan blushes any time Matt or I bring up the subject of this little girl we’re pretty sure he has a bit of a crush on her. It’s something that we enjoy having a little fun with at Brendan’s expense.
Like the other day in the car. I don’t remember how the subject came up originally, but somehow we got on the subject of Brendan’s cello and his little “girlfriend” as well. Doing what all parents are prone to do we threatened to bring out Brendan’s baby photos and embarrass him by showing them to her. At first Brendan wasn’t too worried about it. He didn’t understand why baby pictures would be anything to be embarrassed about. Then I reminded him of the one we’ve got where he’s wearing nothing but a red cowboy hat and he was much more concerned about us showing that around to any of his friends.
Feeling we may have taken our teasing a little too far we tried to reassure Brendan that embarrassing baby photos were a part of pretty much everyone’s past and while humiliating at his age, he’d eventually get over it and not really care. He wasn’t convinced at first, until we assured him that we had the same embarrassing photo of both his brother and sister.
That’s when he brought up Matt and I’s embarrassing photos. I’ve seen my own baby photos a few million times and I couldn’t immediately remember any of me sans diaper, but I did remember a series of pictures with me having mashed potatoes smeared all through my hair that my family seemed to find overly amusing when I was growing up, so I told Brendan all about that. In one sentence Brendan managed to take what had been a fun lighthearted conversation and turn it into something that made me feel incredibly old.
He looks at me and says, “Since they are from when you were a kid, are those pictures in black and white?” Wait…WHAT??!?!?? Black and white? How old do you think I am? The better question I suppose is how recent does this kid think color photographs are? I’ve seen quite a few pictures of my mom growing up and only about half of hers are in black and white, and even then I always assumed it was because my grandparents didn’t run out to upgrade their camera the instant color photographs became available.
After assuring him that my baby pictures would indeed have been in color, he turned to Matt and said, “but daddy’s would have been in black and white right?” Well at least I can say it’s not just me he thinks is old. Matt got roped right into that same category. Evidently the four years difference in our ages translates to a major change in technology to Brendan.
I recognize that the world my kids are growing up in is 100% different than the world Matt and I grew up in. For one thing computers and the internet are everywhere and accessible to just about everyone. Whereas I didn’t have a home computer until I was in highschool and internet was used to check your email once every few days versus being accessible at the click of a button. But holy cow I still thought they would know the difference between technology that had recently come into being versus one that had been invented eons ago.
I guess not. Brendan must think that if we didn’t have computers then we must not have anything else either. We rode to school on dinosaurs and had to chisel our homework onto rocks. Nothing makes you feel old faster than a smart mouthed kid.
Diary of a mom...grade 3 and beyond 