Back in My Day

This week, I am thrilled to introduce to you, my son and guest blogger, Chris Koehne. This post originally appeared in a school newsletter, then his own blog site (which never went live) and now here, where you get to read it. As he jumps into the world of writing (a son after my own heart) I hope that his words, his insights and his humor , although it can be a bit strange at times (again just like his Mama)  can brighten your day. ENJOY!

​
SNAPCHAT! A photo app that allows users to send a picture to a friend that supposedly disappears after a predetermined amount of time. Pish posh! All of those pictures are saved and anything can be screenshotted! And what’s the point of sending a picture for 5 seconds anyways?

A picture should be a work of art. I don’t go to the Phoenix Museum of Art to look at pictures for a few seconds, that would be silly and a waste of $17.99! (sidebar: I don’t go to the Phoenix Museum of Art. Honestly, I don’t even know if it’s called the Phoenix Museum of Art, it could be called the Phoenix Art Museum or even the Phoenix Art House for all I know. But if it is called the Phoenix Art House it’s probably run by a bunch of hipsters who say things like “you can’t define art” or “High School Musical 3 was actually pretty good.” Either way, they shouldn’t be trusted.)

But nowadays I see boys walking around after school taking selfies and giggling when they send it to somebody. What’s up with that!? As a matter of fact, on Tuesday, I saw Hugo standing by himself in the middle of a basketball court taking a selfie while making a duck face! What has this world come to!?
 
Back in my day guys didn’t take selfies! If you wanted to send a picture of your face to somebody, you didn’t! But if for some odd reason you wanted to, that would have required you to take a picture with an actual camera. Then after that you would have to take that camera to your local Walgreens and pay $13.99 just so you could wait 24 hours for your photos to develop by some guy who is going to look at all of your pictures and laugh at you when you come back in to pick them up. Then once you have the picture you would have to wait in line at the post office behind somebody’s grandma who can’t figure out which state her grandson lives in. (sidebar: don’t be mean to grandmas, my grandma loves going to the post office and mailing me letters. Let your grandma know you love her.) So then, days later, once your friend finally receives the picture in the mail they are confused about why they are receiving a picture of your face. (sidebar: They are also kinda creeped out that you know their address and they probably don’t want to be friends anymore… (sidebar from the sidebar: it’s an awkward way for a friendship to end, don’t mail people a picture of your face))

​Instead of guys taking selfies and deciding which filter makes our ugly mugs look the best, we would actually talk to each other and play games like Yahtzee or try and figure out the rules to Clue. But we definitely didn’t stand by ourselves and take selfies like Hugo, and that’s just how it was, back in my day. - Chris Koehne