Look at me… Now!

-- by Ranjitha Ashok

Click.

A picture of a sambar-vadai. Message: ‘Enjoying the world’s most delicious vadai …doesn’t everything taste better when eaten with friends question mark-question mark-exclamation-exclamation-heart-heart-heart.’

Everyone is smiling into the camera, and you notice the sambar vadai is smirking too.

And why not? It’s just won the world championship.

Click.

A footencased in blingy footwear. Message: ‘All set for my cousin’s mehendi!’

Okay – first point: You can’t help thinking that that one foot alone can probably light up a stadium, and secondly: The owner of that foot is a complete stranger, and now there’s a mysterious ‘cousin’? But hey, somewhere out there is a mehendi. Have fun – whoever you are.

Click.

A cat on its back soaking in sunshine. Message: A loaf of bread, a jug of wine and thou beside me.

Huh? Not quite sure Mr. Khayyam had a cat-in-the-sun in mind when that was written. Dr. Seuss, maybe. But a 12th century Persian poet? Bit of a stretch, pic-sharer.

A stylised ceramic dish filled with steaming rasam, shot from all angles. Message: Homely so yummy.

And look at this montage…this person is drinking coffee looking to her right, looking to her left, standing up striking an attitude, sitting down striking an attitude, looking straight at the camera, now over her shoulder holding cup in extended hand, now climbing up the stairs, now down the stairs, all the while drinking coffee, drinking coffee, drinking coffee…dear God, seriously?

What next?

100 photos that show the hundred stages of paint drying?

And macro photography? Really? Do we need an enlarged shot of a human eye with no other claim to fame other than that the owner wanted to ‘share’?

Or one showcasing pani-puri guzzling?

Now, pani-puri is sinfully delicious, but let’s face it…even a Miss Universe can’t quite pull off those stretch-the-mouth-as-wide-as-possible-pop-chomp-and-don’t-let-the-pani-squirt-out-of-your-mouth-and-land-on-your-chin-or-on-anyone-else demands that dish makes.

Question: Where does this need to share every breath you take, every move you make come from? (with due apologies to a certain rock band)

Click. Click. Click.

No moment of everyday life is too mundane to be photographed…and shared.

Old nursery rhymes play in your head in a creepy, sinister loop:

“This is the way we brush our teeth

This is the way we comb our hair

This is the way we wear our deliberately casual footwear, walk down the road, buy potatoes, drink a glass of water…

This is the way we live our lives in a laaargge glass bowl…”

And it isn’t just about living – voluntarily – in a glass bowl. It’s entire lives in a permanent state of bubbling-over fizz on parade.

‘Bestest’, ‘most fantastic’, ‘amazing’, ‘thrilling’ …don’t these people ever get tired of being a particularly brilliant shade of ‘Rani-pink’ all the live-long day?

This isn’t just a human problem.

This click and share culture has made mannequins of everyone…and everything.

Members of other species, and even inmates of the inanimate world, have gone all pose-ey and cutesy on us.

Your dog now feels injured if you don’t click him at least 57 times a day.

“What? Suddenly I am not ‘shweet’ enough for you?” he growls, indicating with a dramatic gesture that he needs to see his pet psychiatrist at once. (And that’s just another photo op, isn’t it?)

As for cats – don’t even start.

You walk past one sunning itself on your garden wall, (and you know how cats are…they’ll sneer at you in your own home like you are the trespasser), and this cat, who was all along just flopping on the wall in a bindaas, boneless manner, suddenly straightens up and tries to look about ten times cuter than it actually is.

A side-table, in a deep sulk because pictures of her ‘so-now’ look have yet to be posted, moves away in a marked manner, which explains why your tumbler of steaming hot filter coffee fell mysteriously to the floor yesterday. Your latest outfit tries to whack you in the face with a sleeve, reminding you that it is still waiting to appear on that famous sharing-platform-you-must-be-seen-on-24/7.

Just landed after a long flight? Well, you’d better look picture-perfect. How else will your ‘Airport-Look’ get a million likes? (And that’s another thing – as if Life isn’t competitive enough, the human race has devised one more reason to feel shortchanged.)

Ordered a fancy drink? Click.

Tried a new dish? Click.

Holidaying somewhere exotic? Or not – preferring to go all understated and spartan? Click.

At home, everyday-fare is now refusing to come to the table unless they are dressed up all fancy-like, and all cell phones are ready to click.

“We want to be called something nice too,” they demand, “Like ‘soul food’ or ‘nurture-als’…and while you’re at it, please look up the dictionary. ‘Homely’ doesn’t always mean what you think it does.”

Even babies arrive all photo-friendly these days.

As for Nature – She defines beauty anyway, but these days is quick to feel injured if she isn’t being clicked at all the time. And if Nature is a touch disgruntled? Trouble with a capital ‘T’.

Now don’t get the wrong idea.

No one’s being a crusty luddite of a curmudgeon here.

(And yes, everyone knows ‘Click’ no longer applies in this particular context, but hey, it’s just symbolic, ok? And yes, a simple solution is to just shut your eyes and ears to all this din. Agreed.)

Agreed too that there’s lots of good stuff out there – fun, serious, thought-provoking, informative, life-lesson-y … lovely to share – great to look at.

It’s the obsessive, relentless ‘I exist therefore I click and share’ school of thought that can get a bit much at times. (So please put away those sticks and stones, thank you.)

Click, click, click – camouflages the tick-tock-tick-tock of your life, doesn’t it?

You take your cell phone out of your bag to make a call.

Wait a minute.

Did that 10-month-old just lean out of its stroller and wink at you?