We Do Not Yet Understand the World Our Kids are Growing Up In

Wikipedia

Both of my kids have been back in school for about a month now. My daughter is in kindergarten and my son is a fourth grader. We did virtual for nine weeks last year, but sent both kids back when we found out that our school district was following what the doctors and scientists were saying. They wore masks, did great contract tracing, we were notified every time there was a case, the district really did a solid job.

When this year started we were definitely going to send the kids back. Again, there is a mask mandate, most of the teachers are vaxxed, hopefully 5-11 years olds will be able to get vaxxed soon, it is pretty much the same as last year. We have, again, been very happy with how they are handling school during this pandemic. The other night something happened though that shook all of us adults to our core.

The kids had school pictures recently. They both came back great. I'm biased, but my kids are adorable so they always take great pictures. My son looked sharp. Nice combed hair, good smile, looked good and his picture was great. My daughter is very pretty but she doesn't like to follow directions all that much. Her picture is great, but she has taken better pictures. She is much more of a candid photo kid. So when her pictures came back she had a very forced smile and her hair was wild. She refuses to let any of us put it up so it just flies around. She has a ton of hair too. She also does this weird thing with her shin when someone tells her to smile. She juts it out. It is very forced. You can tell she doesn't want to do it, but she knows she has to for the picture. So we got together with some family members the other night. Don't worry, everyone who is eligible is vaccinated. We all got vaccinated as soon as we could. So we all felt safe enough to have a remake Thanksgiving since we missed last year. At one point during the dinner, when the kids were playing, my wife brought up the school pictures. No one else had seen them besides us and our folks. My wife took photos to have on her phone and we were showing them off. It was pretty fun. Seeing their aunts and uncles reactions was priceless. Everyone we were with was very funny and quick witted. So of course when we showed off our daughter's picture, jokes were made. It was all in good fun. No one was being mean. Again, my daughter is beautiful so we are all so shocked when we see the way she fake smiles now.

After we talked and laughed for awhile one of my daughter's aunts called her over to ask a question. The aunt's question was simple enough, "what did they tell you when they took this picture?". See, pretty simple. My daughter's answer is what crushed us all. Most five years olds would say that they were told to smile or comb their hair or that the photographer told them a joke. My daughter said, "they told me to take my mask off". We all gasped. At that moment, those eight words crushed us. We all realized how different a world our kids are growing up in right now. We never had to deal with this when we were that young. There was no pandemic when I was five. We didn't live in a world where quarantine and social distancing were a thing. We didn't have all these restrictions. I think what hit us the most was how nonchalant my daughter was about it. This is the world she lives in. She understands how important it is to be masked. She gets it. It has never been a problem for her. She is so good about wearing her mask. In a way I was proud of how she answered. But man what a shock it was to hear her say that. She is growing up in a wildly different world than any adult in over 100 years. But, I say again, I'm proud that she knows the right thing to do, and why it is important to wear a mask. But that quote will stay with me, and I'm sure the other five adults that were at that dinner.

That really shook us up.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast.

Come and support Ty and the podcast on Patreon.

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.