While I was deeply desiring a baby, I couldn’t get enough of anything baby-related. I was a closet reader of magazines like Parents, loved catalogs by Hannah Anderson and adored baby pictures of children known and unknown to me. This was at the height of the Anne Geddes craze, so I was able to get a baby pic fix pretty readily. I never did buy any of her stuff though. Especially her last coffee table book which freaked me out with those women wearing sheer dresses with babies tucked underneath. Ick.
Last night I was groping through piles of old papers and mags and zines looking for a pediatric medicine dosing chart from our doctor. Bec has had a cough that has been having me keep vampire hours and I had decided that his little cough and mommy could use some extra help. (This was after I’d been up 5 times in 3 hours, two nights in a row.) While scrounging around, I found an old New York Times Style section from March of this year that I hadn’t read yet.
I got around to reading through the section this afternoon and came across an article by Bob Morris titled “Baby Pictures at 10 Paces”. He basically writes that with new technology involving family pictures, there is no longer a drive for wallet sized photos and that everyone is now emailing, camera phoning, blogging, and modeling their kids to others. And while this is to be expected, he asks that people use restraint around their non-kid acquaintances.
This reading brought me to analyzing my current habits of baby pics. Was I annoying to people by group emailing the most recent studio pics of my two? Should I begin again to limit my scope to family only, not including friends or clients? Would anyone really have the guts to ask me not to send these out? Although I love receiving these types of images, had I recognized that there are people who really don’t appreciate them? This really is something to think about.
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September 21st, 2006 at 12:35 am
Hey, I figure if you are a parent, you have the RIGHT to share pictures!! grin
Mary
December 26th, 2006 at 6:21 pm
In general, if I were in that position, I would only send pictures of children or pets to relatives or friends/colleagues who have expressed interest in receiving them – perhaps draw the line at people who share their own such phots with me. As someone experiencing infertility, I also find it challenging at times to receive the “look at our cute baby” pictures of my niece. A bit of insensitive self-indulgence, anyone? Simply offering up my own view – not at all saying that you’ve been insensitive to those whom you’ve sent pictures.