Your mother just discovered the dog filter. Your father found the face-swap. Your family group chat will never recover. Nigerian parents with Snapchat filters are a national emergency. Your mother sends you a video with the flower crown, speaking in a voice three octaves higher. "Good morning, my dear. How was your night?" She looks 25. She is 55. The filter is working overtime. You don't know whether to laugh or call a therapist. Your father discovers the face-swap with your baby picture. He sends it to the family group with the caption: "Who is finer?" The answer is obviously the baby. He argues for 20 minutes that he is still handsome. Your mother agrees to keep the peace. The group chat is now a comedy show. And the filters they choose! The ones that smooth skin to plastic. The ones that enlarge eyes to alien proportions. The ones that add makeup your mother has never worn. She saves these photos. She prints them. She frames them. The real her is disappearing under layers of digital enhancement. But the joy is real. Your parents are having fun. They are learning technology. They are embarrassing you publicly. It's what they were born to do. Which filter did your parents discover first? And what's the most cringe family group chat post they've sent?
