Going Viral

It was Just Another Day Making Portraits...

It was just another day making portraits, this time in Washington Square Park in New York City, when we were approached by a young man doing TikTok videos for a project he called Behind the Screen. I’m guessing that many of you may have already seen it, but here it is, all 46 seconds of it:

(NOTE: If there is no sound when you start the video, mouse over the video screen and the sound icon should appear at the bottom, Click on it to unmute.)

@behindthescreen__What’s really hiding Behind The Screen? 📲 From cell phone lock screen wallpapers to last texts sent, we’re revealing personal stories from everyday people on the streets! ❤️ Watch as we uncover surprising, funny, and heartwarming moments! #BehindTheScreen #interview #streetinterview #fyp #nyc #newyork #couplegoals #couple #relationship #love #wallpaper #wallpapers #marriage #marriedlife

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This 46-second experience for Linda and me has been viewed 2.1 million times, garnering nearly 300,000 Likes, over 2000 comments, and more than 30,000 shares.

Since I didn’t have a TikTok account, I hadn’t seen the video until a week later when my friend Borut in Slovenia texted me saying, “Don Bobby is in da hauze!!!” Needless to say, we were blown away seeing that our little moment in the park had gone viral.

What was even more astonishing and amusing to us, however, were the observations, and the tone of those observations, left as comments. They arranged themselves into a number of specific categories, and I thought I’d share some of them with you. (No corrections have been made to spelling or grammar).

EMOTIONAL REACTIONS

In this category there were countless heart and teary-eyed emoji responses, as well as comments like these:

• may this love find me

• This man should get the Noble prize for how to treat a woman

• my husband better talk about me like this when I’m not around!!!! 🥹

• Why wasn’t I born 50 years ago so I could find men like this. The moment he said “you see this woman, she is the kindest” my heart just melt

• I want to be loved out loud like this

• The respect and adoration for her radiating from his being is everything. He’s unafraid to say exactly how he feels about her and NONE of it is about her physical attributes.

• Damn does he have a brother 😭

  This man is VIBES

There were 31,000 Likes regarding a comment that pointed favorably to my saying “Show her on film.” I guess it struck a nerve.

APPEARANCES

There were several comments about my appearance, noting that I resembled Ted Danson, Brian Badonde, and reminded someone that I looked like Davoe from The Flash. There were also quite a few mentions that folks thought I was a woman: “thought the man was a woman at first glance😭 my bad”; “Am I the only one who thought he was the woman?!”; “I thought they were lesbians”

For Linda’s appearance, there were a few comparisons to Uma Thurman, Glennon Doyle and Patty Scialfa. But there were nearly two dozen references to the photographer, Annie Liebowitz:

• I’m not entirely confident that’s not Annie Leibovitz

• I thought so too, but Annie L is gay.

• at first i thought he was a woman and the wife was Ann lebowitz.

• Thought it was Annie Leibovitz but then he said she’s kind and grounded (I laughed out loud at this comment).

At least a dozen people commented on the baseball cap in my hand:

“I spy a @Wichita Wind Surge hat!”; “Is my man holding a Wichita Wind Surge hat?!?”; “Wichita Windsurge hat??” (Linda happens to be from Wichita. That’s why I have the hat.)

And this: “Notice how he still got a head full of hair 😂😂😂 peace in relationships is really an underrated blessing. They both look good”.

Also, “They even look like each other”

CYNICAL

Lest you think all of the comments were light and complimentary, there were a bunch of darker messages:

• I bet he’s cheating on her

• I don’t trust him

• Liberals all look the same

• He sounds like trump.

• nah, I’m too jaded to trust even him

AGE

The most enjoyable comment out of the 2000 plus, however, came from our twenty-eight year old granddaughter, Sydney, who exclaimed in all caps:

THOSE ARE MY GRANDPARENTS. Later she followed up with this remark after engaging with other commenters, OH MY GOD this is so crazy!!

Yep, it was crazy for us, too, Syd. We were viewed by over 2 million people worldwide, and it was simply just another day in America while we were at work doing the “photography thing.”

Thanks for reading, and, by the way, did you have any thoughts or comments regarding the video? Let us know in the comments.