Opinion | The Instagram Husband Ponders His Own Account

It started as a lark. Your wife, sitting up in bed one evening, said that she was going to photograph the chickens and put them on Instagram. Or the barn conversion. The house you inherited that she was redecorating in a modern country vein with an updated color palette. Your black Lab — but in a von Trapp-style Trilby hat.

Why not? you shrugged. She had always been good at aesthetics, after all. It seemed harmless, like an extension of her fashion sense; her taste in shoes, earrings, children’s haircuts, moms’-night-in trompe-l’oeil crudité platters that other women seemed to envy.

Her account started with fun little snaps. Harvesty things like full moons and leaves. French things like knives cutting into rounds of Brie and dockyard locals in watch caps. Cotswold things like painted wooden pub signs of pigs with whistles. (Name of pub: The Pig and Whistle.) Pre-empting envy, she was careful not to photograph the entire house with all of the acreage — maybe just an outbuilding or two or a moodier close-up, say, “Mud Puddles.” Or the time you scored an invite to Christmas dinner at Aspen and there was a uniformed staff of 24. No need to go there.

It was Gwyneth-adjacent but with a more down-to-earth vibe. But not too down-to-earth. It was cut flowers and cakes and children’s parties and baguettes on bikes. The occasional topiary in the shape of a cat or a pineapple or King Charles (thank you, local shears-sharpening service). And you — of course, you. She would never be so shallow as to project an aura of availability. “Smile, Babe!” she’d say when you jump-started the old Merc on a running downhill so you could drive to the farmers’ market to buy rhubarb and ramps.

You laughed at how quickly she caught on. “Ha!” you said to yourself on a proud note when someone who was someone or knew someone (tbh you hadn’t totally followed the details) tagged her leading to a surge in followers. “Ha! Look at that.” No one could have predicted that that was only the beginning.

The posts got a little more elaborate. And you were right there to help. Now, your old black Lab — your bachelor dog who predated her by two years — was wearing not just hats but costumes. Sometimes you had to hold a flashlight or jury-rig a follow-spot so that the old boy’s face, sticking out between the 18th-century wig and puffy shirt, would light up just right. Or throw a strawberry at your child’s open mouth 50 times. Or repel down the side of your house in a wet suit and goggles for a lighthearted post about mezcal-based cocktails. But no one could deny your wife had the vision.