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He did the 'sweetest thing ever' for prom and the internet is loving it.

It's prom season ... and you know what that means.

Teens across America are getting dressed up, making reservations at their most luxurious local Applebee's,  then dancing the night away in a school gymnasium where the basketball hoop has been artfully decorated to fit the theme. (Quick question: Why is the theme sometimes Titanic? Do people not know what happened after all the dancing was done on that ship?)

Prom also means agonizing over who you're going to go with. Are you going to ask someone? Will you wait and hope to be asked? Will you go alone? With a group of friends? Who will you take photos with? And will they end up in the yearbook?

You remember what that was like, right? It was a big deal.

So one high school senior became a big deal — all because he brought his mom to prom.

Meet Joe Moreno (aka Joe Angel), a senior in Corpus Christi, Texas. Back when he was in middle school, he asked his mom, Vanessa, to prom. Now, that may sound a little strange, but Moreno had a very good reason. Well, two.

First, moms are awesome. Second, Joe's mom missed her own prom. Vanessa had to leave high school when she became pregnant at 17. So all the things she thought she'd get to do, she told KRIS-TV, had to be put aside so she could raise Joe, and eventually, his siblings.

"It was a sacrifice that I had made. My sacrifice was to give my children my all. I put everything into him. I push them to become everything they can," she said.

Joe thanked his mother, who he refers to as "the most important woman in his life." He told the school his story, asked for permission to bring his mom, and then picked her up with a corsage in hand.

The mother-son duo topped it all off by taking official prom photos, which Joe posted on Twitter.

Joe's story has the internet in happy tears.

In a world where things are often frightening and confusing, this story provides the level of wholesomeness that we all so desperately need. Moreno's prom pics went viral, and Twitter couldn't handle their emotions, with scores of people telling Joe how much he'd inspired them.

One person also made an important discovery:

Hey, it's a good dress, okay? It's a good dress!

This story's an important reminder to show the people closest to you how much you love them.

No, you don't have to take your mom to prom — although this could definitely become a trend — but it's never wrong to show love and gratitude to the people who make your life better (in fact, research shows that it will make you happier).

Joe's gift of prom has certainly brought he and his mom closer together. Missing it the first time around was something Vanessa felt she "had to sacrifice so that I could work and give to my child without anyone else helping me." Years later, it turns her her son feels just as strongly about doing right by her.

"My mom's the most important person to me. I really love her and everything she's done for me," he said. Now everyone else does, too.

Pop Culture

Folks are admitting that Boomers weren’t totally wrong. Here are 19 things they got right.

OK, Boomer, you're right about this one.

via Patrick Lannigan/Flickr

The gaze of the approving Boomer.

Over the past few years, Baby Boomers (1946 to 1964) have been getting a lot of grief from the generations that came after them, Gen X (1965 to 1980), Millenials (1981 to 1996), and now, Gen Z (1997 to 2012). Their grievances include environmental destruction, wealth hoarding, political polarization, and being judgemental when they don’t understand how hard it is for younger people to make it in America these days.

Every Baby Boomer is different, so it's wrong to paint them all with a broad brush. But it’s undeniable that each generation shares common values, and some are bound to come into conflict.

However, life in 2023 isn’t without its annoyances. Many that came about after the technological revolution put a phone in everyone’s hands and brought a whole new host of problems. Add the younger generations' hands-on approach to child rearing and penchant for outrage, and a lot of moden life has become insufferanble.

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baby boomers
Pop Culture

Little boy steals the show at his sister's end-of-year dance school concert

This kid was born to dance.

@kleinkwagga1/TikTok

Klein Kwagga understood the assignment at his sister's concert.

Some kids are too shy to ever want to get on a stage, some will spend most of a performance staring awkwardly at their shoes, and some kids love the opportunity to show off what they've practiced in front of an audience.

And then there are the kids were simply born for the spotlight. You know them when you see them.

When Dirkco Jansen van Nieuwenhuizen hopped on stage with all of the other brothers and sisters of the dance students at René’s Art of Dance in South Africa, no one expected a viral sensation. According to Capetown Etc, it was the school's year-end concert, and siblings were invited to come up and dance to Bernice West’s Lyfie—a popular song in Afrikaans. And Dirkco, who goes by Klein Kwagga, took the assignment and ran with it.

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dance
Pop Culture

Weird viral photo of Adele's face exemplifies the phenomenon called the Thatcher effect

The 42-year-old optical illusion is still astounding people.

upload.wikimedia.org /Credit: Condé Nast (through Vogue Taiwan)

Prepare to get Thatcherized.

It seems that Adele is going viral once again.

Perhaps you’ve seen the image in question previously (it seems to make the rounds every couple of years). But in case you missed it—it’s Adele’s face. Normal, just upside down.

Only it’s not normal. In fact, when you turn Adele’s face right side up, what you notice is that her eyes and mouth were actually right-side up THE ENTIRE TIME, even though the entire head was upside down. So when you turn the head right side up, the eyes and mouth are now UPSIDE-DOWN—and you can’t unsee it. Do you feel like you're Alice in Wonderland yet?

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psychology
Community

People share the most practical ways to support new parents after giving birth

Sometimes the best gift is practicality.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

People share the most practical ways to support new parents

There's a lot of preparation that goes into having a child well before they're even born. First there are the physical changes your body makes to clear up some space for a tiny human roughly the size of a watermelon. Then there's preparing the nursery, buying lots of extremely small clothes, diapers and an expected understanding that while sleep may be your friend, you won't be getting any of it for about a year.

Lots of people give plenty of advice to help you cope in the early days but after the baby arrives, the focus shifts to solely the baby. It's obviously not a deliberate shift. Babies are just more shiny and new that the parents. But not everyone forgets about the parents once baby makes their grand entrance–some go out of their way to make sure the parents feel supported.

Upworthy asked its audience, "what was the best non-baby related gift you received as a new parent," and the answers were a masterclass on how to care for new parents.

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postpartum gifts
Family

A mom seeks doctor's help for postpartum depression and instead gets a visit from the cops

Too many women lose out on much needed support because of unwarranted stigma.

Canva

Postpartum depression is very common, and treatable.

Jessica Porten recently visited her doctor four months after giving birth to her daughter, Kira. She wasn't feeling quite like herself.

She had been dealing with overwhelming sadness and fits of anger, which she knew was likely stemming from a case of postpartum depression.

In a Facebook post, Porten recounts the story of that appointment.

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Identity

Formerly enslaved man's response to his 'master' wanting him back is a literary masterpiece

"I would rather stay here and starve — and die, if it come to that — than have my girls brought to shame by the violence and wickedness of their young masters."

GOOD

A photo of Jordan Anderson.

In 1825, at the approximate age of 8, Jordan Anderson (sometimes spelled "Jordon") was sold into slavery and would live as a servant of the Anderson family for 39 years. In 1864, the Union Army camped out on the Anderson plantation and he and his wife, Amanda, were liberated. The couple eventually made it safely to Dayton, Ohio, where, in July 1865, Jordan received a letter from his former owner, Colonel P.H. Anderson. The letter kindly asked Jordan to return to work on the plantation because it had fallen into disarray during the war.

On Aug. 7, 1865, Jordan dictated his response through his new boss, Valentine Winters, and it was published in the Cincinnati Commercial. The letter, entitled "Letter from a Freedman to His Old Master," was not only hilarious, but it showed compassion, defiance, and dignity. That year, the letter would be republished in theNew York Daily Tribune and Lydia Marie Child's "The Freedman's Book."

The letter mentions a "Miss Mary" (Col. Anderson's Wife), "Martha" (Col. Anderson's daughter), Henry (most likely Col. Anderson's son), and George Carter (a local carpenter).

Dayton, Ohio,
August 7, 1865
To My Old Master, Colonel P.H. Anderson, Big Spring, Tennessee

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history
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