Attention: Narcissistic Society

This weekend was a great weekend. I literally laid in bed most of the time relaxing, watching tv and taking naps. It was A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! There was a little laundry done and the kids were fed three meals a day, so there was some productivity, but we kept it at a minimum. After lounging Saturday away, my husband suggested we go out to dinner. I'm not sure if it was out of boredom or just to motivate me to actually get dressed and fix my hair and makeup, still not sure, but it worked nonetheless. 

We decide to take advantage of a Christmas given gift card to Outback which is a little less than an hour drive away, but my favorite restaurant. I credit the fact that it is still my favorite place to the distance, because it's not too close to go to all the time, the drive seems to build more anticipation and makes the trek more of a night out rather than a quick place to grab a bite. We arrived a few minutes after 6 pm on a Saturday night and as we walk through the throng of waiting people, I understand and knew there will be a wait. The hostess tells me the wait is running a little over an hour and I put my name down. Now, I'm not one that goes out to dinner a lot on a Friday or Saturday night because as a person with a few brain cells in the gray matter in my skull, I realize that there will be a wait at a restaurant, on their busiest nights of the week, at the most common dinner time of the evening, apparently this is a little known fact. It was not the wait that upset me as the people in the wait. The narcissistic, rude, entitled people are what upset me and made me want to "bless out" a few people during the wait on behalf of the restaurant staff which was beyond hospitable to completely undeserving patrons.

The waiting area: 
I found an open place near the hostess stand to sit down, my daughters leaning against my lap and my husband stood nearby. Next to me, sat a man and a kid halfway laying down taking more that a butt's width of the bench, with the Mom of that household standing nearby. Now, I used to be pretty feminist, and I don't really know their situation, maybe the Mr. has a condition where he needed to be sitting down or his wife likes to stand for long periods of time, but I was proud to be the woman who's chivalrous husband thought enough of her to let her sit down. I look around and there are people standing everywhere, yet most of the benches were filled with older children and young teens playing on their phones and handheld games. I was taught as a child that adults get seats first, but apparently this was not widely taught. Enters pregnant woman. Not just "showing," but very, very pregnant woman. As a previously pregnant in my lifetime woman, I'm guessing that she was probably due in two weeks or two weeks ago. I look around to praise the person who gets up or makes their kid get up to allow Painfully Pregnant Woman a seat, but no one does. Not one person. I wait a minute just to make sure that no one is going to use this as a parenting moment to teach their child about courtesy or respect, but still, no one moves. I get up, I go over to a very tired Painfully Pregnant Woman and tell her "I've got a seat over there in the corner just for you." She gladly accepts, her face rewards me in overwhelming appreciation and I use the teaching moment for my children. I told them that it's always respectful to let pregnant women or the elderly sit down and that I would always expect them to offer their seat to someone else. Of course the irritated at society part of me raised my voice a little as I taught them, just in case anyone else wanted to know. People continue to walk in past the throng of us waiting and act surprised and rudely complain when the hostesses tell them that there is a wait. They act surprised like they didn't just walk past no less than fifty people. Do they think we are a flash mob that just goes in and out of restaurants waiting or do they think they are so better elevated in our society that they don't have to wait too? 

We are seated: 
As soon as we get to our table the head hostess is at our table telling us that we will be getting a free appetizer due to the extended wait. That's great I think, because we were going to get a Bloomin' Onion anyway and the kids were whining for some Loaded Cheese Aussie Fries. So I order our FREE Bloomin' Onion and a small order of Loaded Cheese Aussie Fries for the girls which I more than expect to pay for from our amazingly nice waitress who also apologized for our wait. She takes our order and goes to the next table to check on her other guests when I hear Rude Woman ask in a high horse tone "So, just so I'm clear, you do serve food here, right?" I look over to see Rude Woman said this while eating her FREE appetizer. At this point, I'm hoping Rude Woman chokes on her rude sarcasm or the FREE appetizer while being mean to an overly nice waitress. A waitress who could not control the wait, someone just doing her job, possibly supporting her family, the waitress who is waiting, serving and humbly being nice to Rude Woman who is being nothing but Rude. I want to defend our waitress, I want to give Rude Woman, yes that is her name, an evil glare, but it's not my place and I'm already getting the calm "no" look from my husband who knows my every thought. So instead, I say loudly to my kids "isn't this a nice night out? Isn't our waitress sweet?" Yes, in the same raised tone from the waiting area, again, just in case anyone else wanted to hear. Funny how on the waitress' next run to our section was the platter of food for Rude Woman's table. Rude Woman then sent back her meal because her chicken was just "too dry," asked for to-go boxes and then went to the hostess station to ask for boxes again before our waitress could even get back to the kitchen again. Then Rude Woman complains to the manager, manager gives her gift cards for her inconvenience and Rude Woman finally leaves. In my defense, I'm not eavesdropping, Rude Woman is loud with all of her complaints due to her superiority to society. 

After Rude Woman leaves, we get our check, which is wrong. The Bloomin' Onion is FREE, but the Loaded Aussie Fries have been discounted to FREE too, we should have been charged for this. I tell the waitress, so she can correct the error, but she tells me there is no error, they're FREE too. They are FREE because of our wait, the wait we never complained about. Outback Rocks! I got a night out, waiting time to spend more moments with my family, parenting lessons to teach to my kids, two FREE appetizers and I'm using my Christmas gift card. I have nothing to complain about, well besides one thing...our society.

In this case, Rude Woman was one person, but she represents our society as a whole. Our impatient, narcissistic, rude, condescending, completely disrespectful of everyone but themselves and entitled society. Why does our society think they can treat waitresses, waiters, hostesses or anyone else in the service industry so rude, because they work in service? That does not mean they are less than, it means that they choose to work for a living, just like you, but in a different capacity. It means that they choose to bite their tongue a lot as they serve less than deserving people like Rude Woman to support themselves and their families. No matter what a person does for a living, they deserve respect, but we can't even teach our children what respect is when we allow our kids to take up waiting benches when a pregnant woman or an elderly person enters a waiting area. Our society is what it is because somewhere along the way we quit teaching what respect means, what is looks like and how to show it. Pin it, post it, do what's necessary to remind yourself to use it and if you're a parent, aunt, uncle, grandparent or mentor is some way, love our children enough to TEACH it.

A Bump In The Road

A little disappointed as I log on this evening, or rather in the wee hours of the morning, to see that it has been almost nine months since my last post. I mean that's a pregnancy. No, I haven't been pregnant, nor do I plan to or have the ability to ever again, but that is a long time. Though I wish I could say that I was birthing new ideas or words or something inspirational, motivational or visionary....I can't. I think I just got too busy again to hear my own thoughts. All this talk about birthing is pretty ironic considering the inspiration for this post...

A Bump In The Road...

Tonight, I am driving home on a quiet, country road with my kids riding along in the back seat. They are probably doing something completely un-Norman-Rockwell-painting-like as sisters constantly do when fighting over who has song choice privileges, who's being mean to who and who started it. I am in the mommy moment where I have apparently completely blocked them out as I replay and reflect over the burdens of the day, as it was one of those that leave you heavy hearted for all of those things in life that are completely out of our control and you are only left with the "why" questions. Suddenly, I spot a bunny rabbit begin to run onto the road on my left side, I hit the brakes in a quick and responsible fashion to avoid hitting it, but yet not so much as to risk losing control of the car and putting my girls and myself in danger of an accident. (Yes, you can alert the ASPCA or any other animal rights group now, that while I love animals, I hold humans in higher regard. Sorry if this offends you, but that's just the way it is.) As I slow the car and and approach the crossing point of the bunny, I seem to watch it in slow motion as it darts back toward the edge of the road only to turn around again in the direction of my car. It darts back and forth in this whirlwind state of confusion until I am so much upon it that I can not see the final direction the creature decided upon. But then I hear and feel this small bump beneath my car and instantly know the outcome and feel the ache within knowing that I have hit and killed it. I wait for the questions from my bunny loving daughters as to what the bump or noise was, and am relieved when I realized that they were completely oblivious to what had happened.

I continued driving home, now watching every edge of the road as I am on heightened animal alert for the rest of my treck, but continually replaying the bunny suicide in my mind. Here this bunny took a gamble and as danger approached and panic set in, that same panic caused him to make the wrong decision and head straight into impending death. Suddenly, I wondered how often I, or we, do the same. How often do we step out in chance, guided by faith and courage, only to panic when danger comes into view and that state of panic drive us right into the danger we so want to avoid?  How many times have I committed emotional or situational suicide with the opportunities given to me only because I made the next decision of the journey too quickly, out of reactionary panic, or not of sound mind and emotional state? The answer for myself is far too many, but next time I see the headlights of the approaching danger, I am hoping that tonight's Bump In The Road will remind me to take my time and get out of the road.

Trust Me

Having received a phone call from the school principal to make an appointment to discuss testing for my daughter, I was reminded of a couple of blogs I had written a few years ago. Sometimes we have to just remind ourself to trust Him:


Monday, September 21, 2009

I used to think that premature babies were fine once they made it home from the hospital.  That is until I became a parent of a premature baby myself and have learned that this is a huge misconception.  After a complicated pregnancy and months of bed-rest, McKenzie was born at 33 weeks weighing just a mere pound and a half and measuring twelve and a half inches long.  She spent 67 days in the Newborn Intensive Care Unit before coming home at 3 pounds 13 ounces.  They were hard days in the NICU and I was on an emotional roller coaster.  When she came home I thought our worries were over and she would catch up like doctors said most premies would by the time they turned 2.  This however was not the case for us.   She has had physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy, daily growth hormone shots, various genetic tests and diagnosis, surgery for tongue tie, hearing loss, ear surgeries, and scoliosis.  She has been to orthopedic specialists, gastroenterologists, geneticists, endocrinologists, ear, nose and throat doctor, and we have even taken her cross country to see specialists.  After all this, school decisions seem a small thing, but are still a big deal when you are in the midst of them.

After a great year in preschool, McKenzie’s grades fell dramatically in Kindergarten, and it was not until the end of the school year that we realized she had lost her hearing.  She had surgery to put tubes in her ears, and her hearing was restored.  We realized she had missed a lot of her schooling due to the hearing loss and worked hard with her to catch her up.  She struggled through first grade and again lost her hearing and had to have surgery for tubes.  This year we changed schools from the private school that we were sending our girls, to public school because of our concerns for McKenzie needing extra help that the private school could not offer.  We started McKenzie in Second grade and worked hard with her again.  Every night we were spending two and three hours completing homework and doing extra work to help her to catch up and keep up with her class.  We had one parent teacher conference after two weeks of school and another during the fourth week.  We thought we were going in the second time to begin evaluations for McKenzie to start a special education program, but instead decided to do what had been my worst fear, my worst case scenario, hold her back into the first grade.  We had already started McKenzie to school a year late due to size and development, and now she would be two years older than others in her class.  It had been the decision we had run from and fought so long to avoid, and now we were making it and I yet in the midst of it, I had the peace about it being the right decision for her.  Breaking it to McKenzie was painful.  She did not want to leave her friends, and we both ended up crying and I had to tell her “McKenzie, you have to trust me, you have to trust me and your daddy that we are making the right decision for you.”  As I said these words, it was like God highlighted the “Trust Me” and echoed back to me that I had to Trust Him with the decisions he has made as well, this was not just our decision, but His, and I can trust Him that while we do not know what the future brings, He does.  We have trusted Him for years and he has never failed us.  His word says “I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.” As parents, we try to make the best decisions for our children, though we may not always succeed in doing so.  As our Daddy God, He is making the best decisions for us and he never fails.  I am thankful that in my uncertainty and my unknowns, I can trust Him and his certainty and all knowing power.


Monday, October 5, 2009

My last blog was entitled “Trust Me” and was about Trusting God.  My husband and I had struggled in the past and fought the decision to hold our daughter back in school which ultimately did hold her back.  We worked long hours after school on homework and extra studies to help her keep up in such a way that exhausted the whole family and was beginning to cause her to resent school as a whole.  It was a month ago that we finally made the decision to hold her back into the previous grade. We urged our heartbroken daughter to trust us in the decision as we trusted God in leading us to that decision.  Once again, He hasn’t failed us.  Since changing classes she is getting good grades and reading so well that she has moved up in reading groups.  She is now excelling and has a new found confidence in herself.  What happens when we trust and follow God?  I answer myself with the fact that life gets easier!  It’s one of those answers where I just want to smack myself and say “Duh”.  Why am I surprised?  Why did we fight this so long?  As emotional humans it can sometimes be scary, painful, humbling and just plain hard for us to give in and trust God.  Of course, we may not want to admit that with the fear of sounding unspiritual, but it is the truth.  However, no matter how scary it may be, we have to allow our faith to guide us rather than our emotions.  Do we honestly believe that God would lead us somewhere to hurt us or for us to fail?  Again, His word says “I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.”  So no, He isn’t going to lead us into harm.  Even when it’s scary, risky, and painful, we have to step out and sometimes jump out in full fledged faith that we know his plans are for us and not against us.  As a parent, I love my children and want the best for my children.  Part of my love is protecting my children and I would never lead them into danger.  As our Daddy God, He loves us even more and holds us in the palm of His hand.  He protects us even when we are unaware of the danger around us.  When we can’t trust in anything else around us, we can trust in Him.

What's in your pocket?

A few nights ago I sat to dinner with my step-mom and daughters when I barely heard music playing in the background. I hushed my girls and tuned my ear to hear it playing ever so faintly, but could not pinpoint it's source. I muted the tv in the adjoining room to help direct me to the location of where the music was coming from, but still could not locate it, nor could anyone else hear it. I began to question my sanity as I heard what sounded like a music box playing. Finally, one of my daughters agreed that she could hear what sounded like a jack-in-the-box playing. Yes, I'm not going mad, or at least if I am, my daughter is going to join me in our own private world of LaLa Land. As my step-mom and other daughter sat in bewilderment, I jumped up and quietly tip toed in and out of rooms of the house trying to follow the direction of this music playing. Here I was with pictures of haunted house movie scenes playing in my mind as I searched each room, pausing in further wonder as I opened and shut closet doors. Donna joined me on my search as I came down the stairs and we stood there quietly listening again when she asked me,"it's not your phone, is it?" Not thinking it was the source, I pulled my phone from my pocket to find that a game had somehow turned itself on and it was the background music I had been hearing all along. Here I had spent all this time looking for something that was in my pocket....yes, we all have idiotic moments, and this was just one incidence in my very long list. We laughed off the moment, went back to our meal and I had put the whole thing out of my mind.

This morning I thought about the music box search and laughed at myself once again as I reminded myself that it was in my pocket the whole time. While my search lasted only a few minutes, I thought of how many other things we go on searching for that we forgot we had in our pockets. No, I'm not talking about spare change, keys or pocket lint, what I mean is our hopes, dreams and happiness that we have the ability to access anytime, but we are too busy spending our time looking and chasing other peoples dreams, desires and expectations that we forget, it's in our own pocket. In opening and shutting doors, we forget all about reaching in our own pocket to pull out what hurt, rejection, insecurity, enemies and other oppositions caused us to hide our vision and dreams in our pocket. The thought made me question myself and what things I have placed in my pocket and forgotten about, what do I need to reach into and bring back to light in my life? The thoughts have be rolling and repeating in my mind and there are a few things that I am trying to pull back out and let breath and live in my life. Now, what's in your pocket? Think on it, let it roll over in your mind. There are plenty of "fulfilling your dreams" and "determining your purpose" books out there, I'm not writing one, I only had a few minutes on my lunch break to jot down this thought. But what is it, What's in your pocket?

"Oh God, this is it"

Some dates just ingrain themselves in your memory, January 13th is one of those dates. Not because I am superstitious about the number 13, but because on January 13, 1994, I totaled my first car. Not intentionally of course, but completely totaled nonetheless and almost totaled myself in the process. I was sixteen and driving my little red Pontiac Fiero to school one Thursday morning when I suddenly lost control around a curve in a roller coaster of a road. I wasn't speeding and don't know the cause of the control loss, but I found myself turning to the left and then after over correcting my steering wheel to the right I saw the edge of the pavement before me in slow motion and remember saying to myself "Oh God, this is it!"

I woke up alone and cold with the car still and the only sound coming from a cassette tape still playing in the radio. I looked around me taking in account what had happened to realize I was in the confines of a broken and mangled corpse of a car. I knew that my parents would kill me if they heard the music I was listening to and in severe pain I leaned forward in a desperate and thankfully successful attempt to press the eject button to silence it. I then reached to my door handle to open it and emerge from the car, but the door didn't move and I looked down to see that though I thought I felt my attempt, my arm had never moved from my lap. I was trapped and couldn't move my left arm or legs.

I woke up next to a woman's voice asking me my name, asking me my phone number and telling me it would be okay.

I woke up again to sirens, lights flashing up above me, the sound of my mom's voice and several people talking all around me. The cold was getting colder and pain was overcoming my body. I still could not move within the confines of my car. I began yelling for someone to get me out of this car. I'm going to blame the expletives I was using on pain and shock and finally calmed after my mom instructed me to calm down and hold still. The firemen and paramedics were working to get me out of the car and did not want me moving my neck as they did not know the severity of my injuries. I fell in and out of consciousness as they worked. My sunroof was already broken from the accident, so they cut and pried the roof more and in protection covered me with a sheet to raise me up through the roof.

I woke up again on a hard and even more cold surface and my neck immobilized in a brace. A woman's voice told me she was going to have to cut my clothes off to determine the extent and give aid to my injuries. I pleaded with her in my modesty to keep me covered, still hearing numerous voices all around me. Sixteen and selfishly upset that my brand new jeans and the popular at the time flannel shirt I had gotten only the night before were being cut off my body and ruined.

I woke looking at the ceiling of a hospital room with voices of my mom and friends around me. My neck still immobilized in a brace, I could not see anyone unless they leaned directly over my face. Begging for something for the pain, my mom explained that they would not yet give me anything as the doctors wanted me to be able to tell them where my pain was. It was all over!

Time would determine that I had broken my left arm, left leg and pelvis and the before mentioned shattered sunroof had cut my head causing a substantial loss of blood. A six hour surgery with two of our town's best orthopedic surgeons repaired my arm and leg with rods in both preventing me from having to wear any casts. Yet the combined breaks put me in a wheelchair for a period of about six months. The hospital therapist taught me to walk with one crutch under my right arm within the parallel bars of the therapy unit which I was able to do for short distances. Though my blood levels were low, medicine did not know what we know now about AIDS and blood transfusion, and the decision was made to allow my body to build back it's own blood supply. It was a long process that kept me very tired and just the exertion to take a shower and get ready in the morning would cause me to pass out.

I don't know if I slid on the morning's wet road or if I blew a tire (I had four blown tires at the end of it) causing my wreck. Beyond my mind's distinct picture of the edge of the asphalt my car went over a twenty foot embankment which would have been more if it had not been caught in by the trees in Brenda's yard. Brenda was the woman who I woke to asking me my name and phone number who's schedule never had her home on Thursday mornings ever, except for this particular morning. She was getting ready when she heard the collision outside and instantly called 911, knowing with the landscape whatever had happened would be bad.

I eventually got another little red car, a Nissan Pulsar that time, that I could easily sling my wheelchair in the hatchback of and hobble around the car to the driver's seat. My head healed, my bones healed and through another surgery the following October, I got the rods taken out and as high school senior, I began to play a few sports I had never had the courage to try out for before. After the wreck I had a new sense of trying new things, pushing myself and not allowing intimidation to stop me, I realized the quickness that life could be swept away. I learned about being temporarily handicapped and overcoming obstacles. I learned first hand about divinely appointed timing and the miracle of life.

Yesterday was eighteen years since my wreck. Maybe I am a little superstitious now as I have always picked the number 13 as my lucky number being that it marked the day I beat the odds of living through a wreck the emergency responders said I shouldn't have. I am reminded of it when my little bit of arthritis kicks in after excessive exercise and periods of cold and rain. I still have minuscule splinters of glass that make their way to the surface of the skin on scar of my forehead and my daughters have questioned the surgical scar on my shoulder and the longer one on my leg.  I am thankful that I was wrong when I saw the edge of the pavement, wrong when I said "Oh God, this is it," or was I? Maybe I was wrong in the fact that the pavement's edge was not the end of my life, but right all along "Oh God, this is it," as the edge marked the beginning of my life.

A second gray hair, a rite of passage and a metaphor.

I found and pulled my first gray hair about a year ago, thankfully it took a year to find another one at at 34. I was getting ready this morning, did a final spray of my hair and was just having the "this is a good hair day" thought going through my head when I saw this gray hair emerging from the part in my hair. The light hit it just right and the "good hair day" thought fleeted fast as the gray hair seemed to exclaim itself brighter and brighter amongst my dark brown hair. I grabbed the tweezers and plucked the strand from my hair wondering how I had not noticed it before as it was now a little over an inch in length.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not a gray hair bashing person, I am not fearful of age or the changing of my skin, hair and overall appearance as I age. Though I pulled out this morning's gray hair, I at the same time felt a sense of a rite of passage in this thing called adulthood. Like maybe this gray hair was that of a lesson learned, an obstacle conquered or a hinderance plucked away from my life and I was instantly given the explanation of where this gray hair came from and what it represented. You see I've had a conflict with someone for a few months now and yesterday, we sat down and had a time of reconnection and resolve to work things out. We equally agreed that the longer we had let the conflict go on without addressing it, the worse it had gotten. Ignoring conflict did not make it go or fade away, ignoring the hurts and offenses had only made them grow in substance and grow the distance between us. Our time together yesterday was long overdue, much needed and well served and all parties walked away from the conversation with offenses dropped, hurts extinguished and a fresh and positive outlook on the restored relationship. With the conflict gone, things can return back to normal with no residual evidence...such is the case with my unwelcomed gray hair.

My gray strand was not something that just came up overnight, the longer I overlooked it the longer it grew. The longer I thought about the hair and the metaphor that had been revealed to me in my bathroom mirror, I wondered how fast hair grows. Being the googler I am, I googled it to find that hair grows at a rate of about half an inch per month. How's that for confirmation? At an inch long, my gray hair had been growing the entire time of this conflict. Yet as quickly as I noticed and plucked it away, my hair had once again returned to normal with no indication of it ever being there. It is the same with resolved conflict and forgiveness in the relationships with those we love. Unlike a head full of gray hair, we can not cover offenses and conflict in a relationship with a bottle of hair dye. We have to address conflicts that come up at the first inclination, indication and instance to prohibit them to grow into something bigger and unmanagable. That way relationships can return to what they once were and grow in beauty.

What I learned in 2011

My Top 10 List of What I Learned in 2011

1. Ignorance judges, experience understands.
2. Sometimes we have to separate from the world to remember who we are.
3. Take time off to enjoy the day instead of working it all away.
4. Summer river days are necessary to my well being and peace of mind.
5. Give myself permission to say no to others, so I could say yes to myself and my needs.
6. Somethings can not be fixed, somethings just are.
7. Sometimes there are no words for the situation, other than a sincere "I love you".
8. Being a good person does not mean being a doormat.
9. I alone dictate how I let others treat me.
10. Death is not just, fair or explainable and grief resonates in different ways to different people.

What I learned in 2010

I'm not one to make new year's resolutions for a few reasons:
1: Part of it just seems too cliche to stick with.
2: The rebel in me just doesn't want to follow the crowd into making goals that for the most part people don't stick with past the second week of January.
3: If your resolution is something you really need to focus on or change, you should do it as soon as you see it necessary, not wait until a specific date to start, thus delaying the goal in the first place.
4: I'm already perfect...no changes needed! Ha Ha...that was a joke people. I am far from perfect and realize the gap to perfection widens more with the passing of each day.

So instead of making resolutions, last year I ended my year by making a list of the things I had learned in 2010, instead of focusing on what I might do for the next. I thought I had only saved this list in a facebook post, but after rummaging through months of status updates, I finally found it in a must easier referenced note. I am posting it here, not only for any readers I might have, but for my own reasons of having an quicker retrieval method in the future and to pass the time while I reflect back over the past year to compile a new list for 2011.

My Top 10 list of what I learned in 2010

1. zumba
2. when you don't fit in, be comfortable standing out.
3. family isn't defined by bloodlines, but instead by heartstrings.
4. some of the best times can be around a fire or in a closet.
5. we are all busy, but real friends always find the time.
6. to stop expecting from people what they will never give.
7. I may be at the bottom of some people's lists, but I am at the top of others.
8. to walk the red carpet without tripping in heels.
9. to be comfortable in my own skin, even when others don't approve.
10. to embrace my role as the crazy, eccentric aunt....cause it's a lot of fun.

To text or not to text?

Our pre-Christmas dinner conversation included my dad's obvious disgust of texting and the degrade of social skills that it will bring in our children's generation. I would say, we discussed it, but I just sat there and kept quiet in an effort to avoid the debate. I text, he knows that and we've had this conversation before. In it I feel as the burden of responsibility of the technological advance of our society falls on my shoulders and I am there as the single representative to back it up. My dad rambled on in his rant to explain how texting will eventually have our children socially dumb due to the fact that our current communication skills are lowering as fast as smart phones are rising in our society. He is convinced our children already have a hard time carrying on a conversation and texting, messaging and email will have our future generations completely unable to communicate socially, read body language or foster relationships.

I text, I like the ability to do so and appreciate that I have a record that I can look back to. If I need to have a conversation without anyone eavesdropping, I can text. If I need to ask someone a quick question, all I have to do is text the question and can expect a quick reply without having to rearrange my afternoon schedule to listen to someone talk endlessly about ailments, family drama and so on when I just can't commit to that conversation at the moment. When there is an event or something I need to know, I have it in a text and can easily find the conversation and remind myself without the need of post-it notes on my nightstand, fridge, car dashboard, and every crevice of my purse. I have all I need in one device at my fingertips and I find that quite convenient. I have even referred to a text record to defend myself when accused of saying something I didn't in a recent conversation.

Texting has it's advantages, however I do agree that it has disadvantages. Sometimes we prolong a conversation by waiting for a reply than just hitting the dial button and having an actual voice conversation that would take less time. Text messages void one's capability to pick up on tone, sarcasm and emotion which can lead to misunderstandings or a lack of attention when one desires or needs it. Though we "feel" more connected, texting, social networks and other technological advances can't replace the human's relational need of face time, create memories or foster meaningful relationships.

I let go of the conversation at hand, and gratefully welcomed a new one with the entrance of our daughter, her husband and children, and then sat to a full Christmas dinner spread across the table. After dinner we retired to the comfort of an overstuffed sofa and chairs and talked as family conversations go, interweaving between children, work, history and so on. As we talked, my daughter and her husband sat quietly on the couch playing on their phones. They were in complete oblivion from our conversation unless we specifically called on them to pay attention to something. Though they may have been texting too, they were in the most part playing games on their newly acquired phones. Still, the image of the afternoon plagued me later as I thought back to my irritation of my dad's ranting, yet the fact that his point was proven by my own children as they were unable to just sit and enjoy an Christmas afternoon in conversation with family. I don't fault them, I checked my phone a few times and even uploaded a picture of my daughter to facebook when she finally fell asleep beside me. Nor can we completely fault the phones as, for the most part, teenagers and young adults would rather play a game of pick up sticks than sit and have a conversation with older adults, phones are simply today's distraction. Still as smartphone users and parents of the next generation, we will have to use and teach moderation and the nearly extinct abilities to use reason and respect. Reasoning when is the time and when is not the time to text, play and update our status and respecting the people in front of us enough to put down the phone and be present.