When posting becomes performing
I brought a disposable camera with me wherever I went: to meetups at restaurants, to dinners at cafes, to family gatherings, to high school reunions. Manually, I’d wind the film, activate the flash, and teach the “photo-taker” to look through the viewfinder and press the shutter button to take one out of its limited 39 shots.
After my self-proclaimed photo-op, my family and friends shift their smiles into jaw drops and furrowed brows.
“Why did you buy that?” “Ang mahal naman niyan!” (It’s expensive!) “We have phones and digicams to take unlimited pictures now.”
Deep down, I craved something no smartphone or digital camera could capture一the anticipation of waiting to see how each photo would look without showing the world why it happened. I saw each second as an opportunity to document everything: smile after smile, shot after shot, retake after retake, post after post. In spending too much time taking the “perfect photo,” I forgot to live in the uncaptured moments, the ones that lie behind each shot.
For years, I’ve dined at tables where my phone “ate” first before I did, and the food got cold before I could even taste it. I’ve gone to hangouts where my friends and I talked for the first few minutes, but then we glued our noses to our phones and scrolled until it was time to say goodbye. I’ve had meetups where I didn’t get to know the person I was with, but we’d still take a photo just to say that we “hung out.”
The voices in my head tell me that if my photo is “aesthetic” enough, I’d finally belong in the digital world of my friends’ perfectly curated Instagram stories and posts.
And so, I try to curate my own feed and post my own set of pictures: The sunrise peeping into my morning stroll. My outfit of the day. Mirror selfies with my friends, even when we’re not wearing matching outfits. The cup of store-bought matcha I obviously didn’t make at home.
Each photo seemed wonky, like I’m trying too hard to belong inside a world I’m not supposed to be in. I’m used to facing an online screen, with only my thumbs maneuvering my interactions with my 652 followers. Most of the time, I feel like I’m a puppet whose strings are tied to performing for an audience.
I’ve based my worth on the number of likes I get for each picture I post. If it’s more than 20, it means I’m loved. But if it’s less than five, I wonder if the photo I posted was even worth posting in the first place.
I lived in a reality where social interactions were dumbed down from genuine “how’s life?” conversations to sending video reels and funny memes as text messages. I noticed that supporting your friends means giving a default heart reaction or commenting “PRETTY” or “LOVELY” in their summer travel pictures.
And even birthdays have their own digital equivalence: I post a pretty photo of my friend and me in my 24-hour story and tag them. I’ve seen friends who get 20 or 30 of these digital cards, but I couldn’t even get more than six.
Does a moment need a picture as proof that it happened? Beneath all the likes, comments, posts, and aesthetics, where is the genuine human connection that ties real friendships together? The heartfelt conversations that make me forget about all the cares of this world. The sound of laughter that echoes inside small cafes. The three-year life updates all squeezed into two hours. The hearty meal that just hit the spot.
Maybe it’s time for the puppet to break free from its tied strings. In a world where I demand digital satisfaction, I want to step back from an artificial LED screen and find genuine light and meaning in real-life interactions.
And so, I carry my disposable camera because each photo is still worth taking. Thirty-nine shots, no retakes. I’ll take a “shot” when I live in the moment that lies beneath forced smiles and cold food. I’ll take another if I genuinely feel the warm presence of my family and friends sitting right beside me. Another one if we savor the pasta while it’s still hot. And another if we drink the matcha until only the ice is left. And one more if we laugh our hearts out and talk about school, work, life, and everything in between.
These photos will not be for show. Instead, they will be memories worth keeping, frozen in time. When life just keeps going, and in 20 or 30 years, I’d look back on each photo taken with fondness: the smiles on our faces, the food we shared, and the moment we lived in.
In time, the photos will be the only remnants of what’s left: why I lived, how I lived in the moment, who I shared it with, what we did, and how we felt.
And so, I can’t wait to wind the film and click the shutter button of my disposable camera, with its remaining 18 shots waiting to be captured, developed, and preserved as future memories.
But this time, it is not for my followers, my friends, or my family.
It’s for me.
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Samantha Isabelle Lee, 22, is a creative writing graduate from the University of the Philippines Diliman.
