A Picture Is Worth 1000 Worries

When I started this blog, I decided I would not post any pictures of my daughter (tempting as it was) due to concerns about privacy. I am an extremely paranoid cautious person and I just felt that posting pictures of my family for the world to see would not be the most prudent decision.

Several people mentioned to me that my blog would be so much better if I included pictures of my baby girl. I was initially very resistant as I have concerns about privacy and safety. But the more I thought about it, I wondered if my fears were reasonable.

The more personal information you put out there, the easier it is for your identity to be stolen, for someone to stalk you etc (yes, I know I sound really paranoid right now), but since we live in such a public world, is privacy even real anymore, or is it just a concept we cling to in order to convince ourselves that the world is safe?

When discussing my concerns about privacy, a friend of mine pointed out that anyone can Google anyone else and find tons of information.  My husband pointed out that I regularly post pictures of my daughter on Facebook, so why not do it on my blog? I argued that only my friends can see my pictures on Facebook, and so it is still private, but is it?

What is stopping any of my Facebook friends from showing my “private” profile to one of their friends, or from posting my “private” pictures on the internet?  Even if I decided to be really private, by shutting down my Facebook account and retreating from social media altogether, anyone could still snap a picture of me, write a bunch of personal information about me, and post it online. Not that anyone would - I mean, really, I’m not that interesting- but the point is they could.  (I’m actually better off continuing to participate in social media, because at least that way, I might at least find out if someone posted something about me.)

I’m not sure if all this is scary or reassuring, but I don't want fear to be my main motivator, so I'm now going to have fun showing off photos of my ridiculously adorable daughter. I will continue to be cautious, and I will refrain from posting my bank account information on my blog, but I will also recognize that we live in a very public world, and I am going to try to accept and maybe even embrace this.

What do you think?  Is privacy an illusion in the digital age?

Teething (And Other Earth-Shattering Achievements)

My eight month old daughter got her first two teeth! Yes, I know. You don’t care. But I care, and since this is my blog, I’m going to tell you all about it.

So my daughter is in her high chair and I’m feeding her some healthy pureed organic crap, and she opens her mouth, and there it is! A tiny, adorable almost-tooth! Then, a couple days later, another one!

This is huge! She started crawling a few weeks ago, but for some reason, I think I’m even more excited about the teeth, which is kind of weird since it’s not like I have any special interest in teeth. Actually, I generally prefer not to think about teeth because it reminds me of the dentist which reminds me of having cavities filled, which reminds me that I haven’t been to the dentist in two years which reminds me that I need to go to the dentist. Oh, and I’m afraid of the dentist. Did I say that?

Anyway, back to the teeth. If you’ve been within a 50 mile radius of me lately, I’ve probably asked you to look at my daughter’s amazing almost-teeth.  For some unfathomable reason, no one really seems to care. Whatever. Nothing is going to kill my buzz.

I’m so excited, I almost peed my pants. Wait, no, I did pee my pants. Oh wait, no, nevermind, that was the baby peeing on my pants. God, can no one invent a leak-free diaper? Calling all engineers, astrophysicists, and all generally smart people. What is wrong with the human race? We put a man on the moon like forty years ago, but we still can’t keep the piss in the diaper. Seriously.

The Canadian Dental Association recommends that children first visit the dentist by a year of age. You better believe I’ll be following that recommendation- I get to hang out with someone who actually wants to talk about my daughter’s teeth!

So, yeah, my daughter’s teeth are awesome. But I’m not going to post a picture or anything like that because I don’t want to be one of those annoying moms who thinks that everyone should care about every little insignificant detail in their kids’ lives. Oh…umm..okay, wait, nevermind. But I’m still not posting a picture! And you should care! Because, my baby has two teeth, and it’s kind of a big freaking deal.