I could be mistaken, but it looks like that girl's wrist is deformed or disfigured in some way. Yes, I know it now; there is definitely something goofy happening on that wrist. There are squiggly bumps and lines snaking halfway up her arm. Call me nosy, but I have to know. What kind of horrific injury turns a girl's forearm into a lump of pink, yellow and teal?
"What's that on your wrist? Are you OK?"
"Oh, this? It's just a pony."
"That cannot possibly be a pony."
"Well, yeah, I know. But it's a Silly
Bandz pony."
From the look on her face, I realize I'm supposed to know what this means, but all I can take away from this encounter is "silly." That is certainly an applicable and appropriate word for the mass of rubber bands cutting off the circulation to her hand. Surely there is no reasonable explanation why she just paid real U.S. dollars for these office supplies simply to wear them. To expect anyone to know what shape they actually take is also ludicrous. Her Silly Bandz are now Absolutely Ridiculous Bandz; "Silly" barely covers it.
I admit Silly Bandz freak me out. These bright bands in a whole array of shapes remind me of the infamous "sex bracelets" so popular in 2004 at the peak of middle−school awkwardness and oafishness. A cultural phenomenon revolting in itself, each bracelet stood for a sexual act to be performed upon breaking one. You can understand the ensuing concern I felt, then, when I saw eight−year−olds happily trading brightly colored bracelets highly reminiscent of those from our youth. What kind of cultural disintegration is this?
I brought this topic to the forefront of my friends' attention in a fit of disgust. They're pointless! They're garish! They cannot possibly be flattering on anyone! The list of offenses committed by Silly Bandz was steadily piling up until a friend honestly admitted, "I just want something to trade."
All the lights in my head went off at once, like that coveted Lite Brite we all knew and loved as kids. This is simply the continuation of our childhood tendencies to trade.
When has it ever been "uncool" to trade knickknacks and trinkets? Previous generations rooted in simple joys witnessed the obsession with exchanging marbles, baseball cards and yo−yos. In our own early years, we traded Pokémon cards, Pogs and slap bracelets as overtures to budding friendships — yeah, you loved that guy who gave you a Charizard, admit it. As "emerging adults" — or, simply, college students — we have been swapping spit and trading digits as more mature forms of interaction and bartering. Perhaps that's a different kind of exchange, but you get the idea.
The phenomenon of Silly Bandz is the continuation of a timeless need to trade as a form of basic social interaction. It explains why an equal amount of teens as tots are sporting these bracelets in an attempt to preserve some lasting youth. I had missed the memo; buried beneath hours of computer coding and pages of reading, I had failed to see the childish but satisfying joy of giving your sweetie a rubber band shaped like a pumpkin. Phrased like that, the romance disappears, but these series of exchanges revive that childhood tendency to connect with each other through a shared good. Also, pumpkins are quite timely in light of Halloween.
My heartstrings are pulled taut like the Silly Bandz around your wrist, but I won't be donning these squiggly suckers any time soon, despite my recent revelation. You can bet your Crazy Bones that I'm shipping my Beanie Babies from home, though.
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Madeline Hall is a sophomore who has not yet declared a major. She can be reached at Madeline.Hall@tufts.edu.
