The year was 2016. I was preparing for my freshman year of high school, Donald Trump running for president was still a joke, and Snapchat was releasing its newest function: memories. That’s right: those photos that disappear after a few seconds? Now you can save them forever.
Naturally, 14-year-old me adopted this feature as a principal part of my personality. Of course, I would want to look back on hundreds of videos of the braces-filled faces of my classmates in five years. Everything my friends did was obviously hilariously interesting and needed to be documented. In my mind, I couldn’t imagine how anything would be able to top life right now. Someone had to record it.
At that age, the thought of an unapproved and — God forbid — embarrassing photo of yourself landing on someone’s public social media might as well have been the end of the world.
Thus, as I whipped out my phone to capture a moment I just could not pass up, a chorus of unamused whines escaped from whoever my subjects were. The terrifying possibility of me posting the photo was too much to bear. Without fail, a simple phrase would soothe the complaints:
“For the mems!”
As if these words were a legal contract binding the taken image to hide within my Snapchat photo album forever, no one seemed to mind carrying on with whatever silly or dumb moment I was trying to capture. Although the content I took is primarily cringe-worthy, it is wonderfully authentic to my freshman year of high school.
I have photos on top of photos of my friends and me attempting to present ourselves in an Instagrammable way — dressed in what 2016 deemed to be cute, hands on hips, and most likely dawning a soft smile unless the photo was announced to be a silly one. These pictures don’t remind me of anything except how bad I used to dress or how I desperately needed a better bra.
The images captured — after expressing that they were strictly for the mems — are my true time capsule of freshman year. Genuine moments of what life was actually like, just because everyone knew they would stay between us.
Years have passed since I was 14 years old — thank goodness. My interest in Snapchat has dwindled, but this mantra that I thought had died with bottle flipping and killer clowns has been resurrected. Here I am, sophomore year of college, taking pictures “for the mems.”
Truthfully, my current medium is just my phone’s camera, not Snapchat, but the sentiment stays. If someone is complaining about how they look or the background is decidedly not cute enough, declaring that the photo is “for the mems” has the same charm it did five years ago.
I hope I can look back on these authentic moments in five years with sufficiently less cringe, but the same admiration that I currently feel when reflecting on memories from five years prior.
Knowing something is “for the mems” allows someone like me — a person who has grown up through the lens of an evolving social media world — to appreciate a private moment. Moreover, there is a secure feeling in the absence of looming judgment derived from potential internet personas’ thoughts and comments.
Even on a small scale, having any sort of social media presence can feel oddly important — as if your Instagram account is actually someone’s first impression of you.
Being able to live “for the mems” rather than prioritizing a life that appears cool or interesting or desirable promotes a sense of living for oneself rather than living for the public— even if the public is a bunch of kids you went to high school with, people you met during college orientation and your grandmother.
Instead of focusing on cultivating memories that make a perfect photograph, genuinely live your life, and hopefully, a camera might be there to snap a picture. “For the mems,” of course.
