By Cherimie Crane Weatherford
Have you ever tried to fight the wind? We can take shelter, brace ourselves against unforgiving gusts, and shield from wind-powered debris. But fighting it, avoiding it, or strategizing a response for its next move is far more difficult. The damage it inflicts often depends on where you are, how exposed you are, and what you’ve built to withstand it.
Of course, there is a positive side. Wind can propel our kites on a summer’s day. Mystical music dances in the breeze from colorful chimes. Sailboats depend on it to set out on their journeys.
Do the positives outweigh the negatives?
As a mother of a young child, my instinct to protect is as natural as it is to inhale. The desire to shield and shelter her from danger is secondary only to breathing.
We are facing a headwind that whistles through the tallest pines of her generation — one that my generation helped strengthen. It moves through the cracks of our most delicate corners, exploiting weakness in the very structure of our society.
Parents can’t shelter their children from its reach, nor can they see its motive or intent — only its aftermath. Social media has its positives. But again, do they outweigh the negatives?
It is my generation that produced this unstoppable energy. Its grip on all aspects of daily life was shaped by our need to be connected. Our need to know, to see, to do more resulted in our current fears: fears to protect our children from being seen, from being known, from having the worst done to them.
They have watched us giggle at videos, post photos of them from birth and beyond. They’ve seen us scroll, watching as our relationships become more virtual than virtuous. We forget they are listening and learning.
We would be judged — condemned, even — if we dropped our children off alone at an athletic stadium filled with strangers. Yet we hand them a phone and trust that everything they encounter is well intentioned, safe, and developmentally appropriate.
We wouldn’t take them to an adults-only island, but they have free reign on TikTok to hear and see adult behaviors — without context, filter, or guidance.
How do we rationalize this untethered access? Has it become as natural to us as the wind? Are we so accustomed to the pleasure and pain of powerful gusts that we assume our children know the difference between shelter and sinister?
Even the children without access to this energy still feel the breeze of being the odd one. The children without TikTok are excluded from the jokes, dances, and virtual gatherings of their peers. As parents, we tell them it’s not appropriate. Yet every aspect of our own lives is tied to social media. We say, “It’s not a big deal.” But it is.
The language of youth no longer lives in the hallways of school, the sidelines of athletic fields, or the spindles of their bicycles. It is formed in the palm of their hands — shaped by strangers from around the world. And those strangers have full access to the raising of our children.
As middle school enters our family, the wind is howling. My inability to fight what I can’t see is a blistering cold unlike anything I have known. I know the wind can pierce her thickest jacket, tilt her favorite sail, and find its way through cracks I don’t yet know exist. My generation created the storm her generation must weather.
If we cannot stop the wind, we must build stronger walls. And if we cannot stop the storm, we must at least teach our children how to read the sky.
Cherimie Weatherford is a long-time real estate broker, small business owner, wife and mom in beautiful Beaufort. She is the Director of Operations and Programs for the Freedman Arts District.
