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Lost Phone or Lost Mind?

Posted on January 15, 2014 by susanrray

7898 While talking on the phone with JoAnn, my college roommate, I said, “Let me read you what our friends sent in texts yesterday.”  JoAnn’s phone doesn’t receive text messages.  I continued talking as I walked around my house.  “I’ll get my cell.  You’ve got to hear Blondie’s news!  Where is that phone?  When are you going to get a phone so we can send you texts?  I can’t find my phone.  It’s not in my purse.  Not charging.  Not on my desk.  Oh, I’m talking on it!”  For the next five minutes, JoAnn laughed in my ear.

I really did that.  I lost my phone while I held it in my hand.  When I told my family and friends what I’d done, they shared that they’d done the same and more.  Daughter said that when she discovered I’d left my cell phone at her house, she called me as I drove out of her driveway so I’d come back for it.  My phone rang while she held it in her hand.

Marilyn said that her cousin’s phone rang while the two of them were shopping in a department store.  Her cousin searched madly in her purse as it rang and rang, but she couldn’t find it.  Finally, she quit looking and told Marilyn, “It’s not here.  I must have left it in the car.”  So how did she hear it ring?

Most of us have called a phone that we’ve misplaced and hoped that its ring would lead us to it.  Jo admitted that she asked a drive-thru window bank teller to call her phone number while she held her purse up to her ear to see if it rang.  That’s good customer service.

Lana said that she lost her glasses while they were on her face and lost her keys while holding them in her my hand.  And her car has a mind all its own.  It automatically turns toward her house even when she plans to go to the grocery store.

Judy washed a load of clothes without any clothes in the washing machine.  Von bought liquid laundry detergent at the grocery store.  Later that day after he’d loaded dirty clothes in his washing machine, he couldn’t find the detergent.  He was upset and sure that the grocery store bagger hadn’t put it in his bags.  At lunchtime, he opened his refrigerator and found the detergent.  Right on the top shelf where he’d put it.

Kathy walked from her bedroom to her kitchen to take medicine.  But then she couldn’t read the labels on the medicine bottles because she’d left her glasses on her bedside table.

Jo opened Belk’s door with her car key.  She pushed the button on her car key to open her car door at the same moment that she stepped in the right spot that made Belk’s automatic door open.  She wrote this message to me, “Crazier than a run over dawg!  That’s what we are, sister friend!”  Maybe.

Kathy said, “It’s good to know I’m not alone.”  I agree.  And you know what makes me feel even better?  Most of these people are at least twenty years younger than me.  So my age has nothing to do with the fact that I lost my phone in my hand?  Right?

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Filed under: Everyday Life, Friends | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a comment »

One Word for 2014

Posted on January 8, 2014 by susanrray

imagesA few days into 2014 and so far, so good.  I’d thought about New Year’s resolutions, but hadn’t made any yearlong commitments.  I’d just keep on keeping on and try to make better choices.  Try to eat good food.  Drink more water.  Exercise more.  Not waste time.

And then my niece posted a question on Facebook, a question that she’d heard discussed on a morning television talk show.  What one word would you choose to motivate yourself through 2014?  A word flashed in my brain and I immediately posted a comment.  Intentional – that’s my word.  Intentional with minutes, hours, and days.  With prayer and praise.  With a positive attitude.  Intentional when I eat and drink.  When I play and work.  When I spend money.  When I write and read and see and hear.  Intentional.

It felt good to have a plan, all wrapped up in one word.  And that day went as intended.  With ceremony, I ate a piece of Christmas dried apple stack cake and drank a perfect cup of coffee.  I watched the chickadees and cardinals peck seed from our birdfeeder.  Throughout the day, I consciously followed my intentions.

That night was weekly family supper night at our house and afterwards one Grand would stay overnight.  The next morning would be Grand and Gran time.  Except this night, two Grands would spend the night.  Lou, age 6, and Elaine, her 2 ½ year old sister.  Lou would sleep in the bed where she always sleeps at our house.  Elaine would sleep in a crib in the same room.  We’d eat breakfast and play.  Puzzles, painting, play dough.

At midnight as I lay awake between Elaine and Lou in Lou’s bed, I realized that my plan had gone haywire.  Elaine had climbed out of her crib three times and I decided, while half asleep, that she and I should sleep with Lou.  We slept, but not well.

While we ate breakfast, Lou asked, “Gran, do you have a bathing suit here for Elaine?”  I didn’t.  “Well, do you think this is a good day to swim at the Y?”  I didn’t.  Then Lou said, “I really wanted to practice diving underwater,” and I couldn’t say no to a morning swim.

Forget the puzzles, paint, and play dough, we were going swimming on a cold January day.  An hour later, after we’d brushed hair and teeth and packed towels and dry clothes and gone to Elaine’s house to get her bathing suit and the three of us wore our bathing suits, we stood at the edge of the Y swimming pool.  Lou said, “Watch me go to the bottom, Gran!”  She jumped into the swimming pool and picked up a diving rocket from the bottom of the 4 1/2 foot deep pool.  She stood and stretched her hand that held the rocket high over her head.  Elaine and I clapped and cheered.  “Way to go, Lou!”  I said.

At that moment, a word flashed in my brain.  Flexible – another word for 2014.

Intentional in play.  Flexible to change from puzzles, paint, and play dough to swimming.  Intentional to eat dried apple stack cake.  Flexible to change to a chocolate covered cream-filled donut.  Intentional and flexible.  I need two words for 2014.

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Filed under: Everyday Life, Grandchildren, Writing | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

One Load at a Time

Posted on November 13, 2013 by susanrray

Laundry_Basket_Clean_Clothes_Royalty_Free_Clipart_Picture_100403-040279-741042“I’ve got to get home.  I’m doing laundry today,” I said to Daughter as I left her house.

“Oh, you’re doing both loads for the week on the same day?”  Daughter replied with her head tilted and a teasing smirk.  She’s the mother of four children, ages 8 and under.  Children who play on dirt piles, climb trees, ride bikes, and create pictures with markers.  Her laundry is never finished.  I remember those days, with two young children.  Now, my laundry basket holds dirty clothes for just Husband and me.

Yes, we have automatic washers and dryers.  Doing laundry is easy compared to washdays of olden times.  But think how many times we handle shirts and pants.  We carry, sort, treat stains, load the washer, unload the washer, load the dryer, unload the dryer, fold, hang, put away.  And yet we roll all that into simply “doing laundry.”  Ironing is a whole separate chore.

As I’ve mindlessly sorted and loaded and folded, I’ve pondered.

About socks.  There was a time that I kept a basket, right beside the dryer, for unmatched socks.  I didn’t waste time searching for one short white athletic sock or one black dress sock.  When the basket overflowed, I emptied all the socks onto the floor and challenged my family to find matching pairs.  I’ve never understood what happens to missing socks.  Does the washing machine really eat them?  Two black socks in.  One out.  The other, never seen again.

About folding.  Don’t washcloths that have been tossed in a basket wash just as well as ones that are folded in half and then thirds?  Folded underwear looks orderly in a drawer, but I promise it wears just the same when it’s thrown into that drawer.  When I was teacher and our children were middle school age, any time that I was home, the washer and dryer were going.  But the folding and putting away… there were times that it never happened.  Some clothes went from the clean clothes laundry basket (unloaded from the dryer) to the body.

About stains.  I admit I’m not good at removing stains.  I can get rid of grass stains, but any stain that no one knows how it got there; I’m not good with those.  If a prewash spray doesn’t do the trick, I hope no one notices or I pretend surprise when a friend points out a dirty spot on the front of my blouse.  I’m beginning to think that my friend Carol has the right idea.  She says that she chooses multi-colored blouses with designs so when she drops food, it blends in, and if it leaves a stain, that’s okay.

My friend Beth has two young children and a full time job.  I like her philosophy that she shared on Facebook:  “Had to fold laundry before work since there doesn’t seem to be any other time to do it.  Just sorting thru life, one load at a time.”

Doing laundry for a family of two or four or six.  Doing two loads a week or two loads a day.  All we can do is one load at a time.

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Filed under: Clothes, Everyday Life | Tagged: , , | Leave a comment »

Kids Still Say the Darndest Things

Posted on August 28, 2013 by susanrray

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Remember Art Linkletter’s television program Houseparty and its segment, Kids Say the Darndest Things?  Or how about Bill Cobsy’s weekly TV program in the late ‘90s that was about the funny things kids say?  If anyone ever airs another show that lets children say what I think, I know a few youngsters who’d be perfect guests.  Some of my Facebook friends share their children’s comments, and I really do laugh aloud.

Joel, a first grader, asked his mother, “Do we have a copier at home?”

Mother:  No.

Joel:  Do you have one at work?

Mother:  Um, why do you want to know?

Joel:  Well, money is made on paper and you can copy what’s on paper.

How about this logical reasoning from another five year old?  “I spent all my money, can I buy some more?”

            Kenan was learning the beginning sounds of words.  He asked,  “Does tea, the drink, start with t, the letter?”
Mother: Yes.
Kenan: Awesome!
Kenan: Does Leah Beth (his new baby sister) start with a g’?
Mother: No.
Kenan: Oh, I thought it did because she’s a girl.
            Jonah, age four, pointed to his forehead and asked, “Mom, when I turn five is it called a fivehead?”  Another day, Mother said that her phone battery was almost dead.  Jonah asked, “Will it go to Heaven?”
            And then there’s Max.  When he was two, Max and his mother were looking at some photos of their friends and Max said, “I like the girls.”
Mother:  Yes, we have some pretty friends who are girls.
Max:  I like the naked ones.
            At age four, Max announced that he had a new pet that was small and black and sometimes ate dinner with him on his plate.

Mother: Oh, is your new pet a fly?

Max:  Yes!  And his name is Friendy and I don’t want you to kill him.

Mother:  Well, how will I know that it’s Friendy and not just some other housefly?

Max:  Because Friendy has nipples!

            When Max was five, he said, “I wish I were a tadpole instead of a boy.  Then I could swim more and not get ticks.”
            Travis, age 5, was engrossed in a television program when his mother told him it was time to turn off the TV.  Travis said, “But it’s a cooking show and it’s not over.  Please.”  Mother shook her head.  Travis said, “But I’m learning how to cook.”  Mother shook her head.  Travis tried one more time.  “But, Mom, you should watch too.  You might learn how to cook.”
            Sometimes long words are confusing.  Lou, age 3, saw a short brown twig on the ground and thought it was alive.  She said, “Look, there’s a catterputter.”  One rainy day, Richard asked to take his underbrella outside, and when he wanted binoculars he asked for beach-lookers.  Aaron asked to visit a friend who lived in a condominium.  “Can we go to Russell’s amphibian?”

Thanks, friends, for allowing me to share your kids’ gems.  The things they say would make great reality TV.  I’d set my recorder to watch Kids Still Say the Darndest Things every week.  Meanwhile, please continue to share -we all need a good laugh.

 

Filed under: Everyday Life, Grandchildren, Kids Say Funny Things | Tagged: , , , | Leave a comment »

That’s a FIRST

Posted on August 22, 2013 by susanrray

images “Well, that’s a first,” I said as Husband turned off the TV late one night in June.  “That’s the first time I’ve ever watched the WCTE Auction and not bought something.”  Husband nodded.  “And tonight’s the last night so I won’t have another chance this year.”  I’d bid on several items, but obviously not as the auctioneers suggested:  bid high and bid often.

That first-time thought stuck in my mind.  So on Monday morning, June 10, I started a new list entitled “One New Thing Everyday – A First!” and I wrote, ‘Watched WCTE Auction and didn’t buy anything.’  (Next June I’ll bid higher.)  I wondered how many days I’d do or see something for the first time.  It’s been more than two months and except for three days that I forgot to write and couldn’t remember anything I’d done on those days, I’ve had a FIRST every day.

Most are small, insignificant events and many are things I saw.  Some are happy – some sad.  Some intentional – some just happened.  Most silly – some serious.  Most common – a few once in a lifetime.  What’s the point?  I’m not sure, but I mentioned what I’d been doing to a few friends and one said, “I like that!”  Her encouragement was all I needed to continue.

Many intentional FIRSTS relate to food.  At the cookie store, I almost ordered my favorite, oatmeal raisin.  But instead I tried a walnut, cranberry oatmeal cookie and it was definitely better than my longtime favorite.  For the first time ever, I’ve eaten peanut butter spread on a banana and caramel yogurt and Pig’s Ear Salad and colcannon.  Not on the same day.

I’ve realized I see new things every day.  My newborn Grand.  Twin fawn and their mother in my backyard.  Two-year-old Grand throwing rocks into our backyard creek.  Three Grands – one at a time – riding on a tube with their daddy behind a boat at the lake.  (I could almost do a whole FIRST list about my Grands.)

I pieced and quilted my first quilt.  The marigolds seeds I planted came up.  I went to a concert by myself and toured Granville, Tennessee and the Baxter Depot with friends.  I drove on Cookeville streets that I’d never noticed before and read Garden and Gun magazine.

It’s really not difficult to see or do something new each day.  But sometimes I do something just to be sure to have an entry on my FIRST list.  Like this one:  I tweeted.  I read an email, entitled 5 Reasons to Embrace the 21st Century, that ended with these words:  “Avoid old-fogie-itis and stave off dementia!  Click to tweet.”

So I wrote my first tweet.  Avoid being an old fogie.Do or see 1 new thing a day.Nothing spectacular.Eat colcannon.Drive a new path.Do it.  And immediately, I had followers.  Only one who I know.

I’m taking my own advice.  Who wants to be an old fogie?  Not me.  That’s gives me one good reason for FIRSTS.  And besides, it’s fun to do or see something new every day.

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Observant and Inquisitive

Posted on August 7, 2013 by susanrray

canstock2636420 Husband found a quiet lake cove and anchored the pontoon boat.  The Grands, wearing their snug life jackets, jumped off the front of the boat, swam to the back, climbed up the ladder, and splashed into the water again and again.  What a happy way to celebrate my birthday – with family, on the water, under a cloudless sky, surrounded by trees.  I floated and watched.  Quite comfortable in my one piece, cover-all-it-can, bathing suit.

The Grands’ parents finally declared rest and snack time.  All of us sat on the boat wrapped in towels.  Six-year-old Lou snuggled close and rubbed her hand over my shoulder and down my arm.  “Gran,” she said, “how do you get that fat there?”  Lou patted my back, right under my armpit.  Husband, Daughter, Son in Law, and Lou’s three siblings looked at her and me.  I tugged on my bathing suit to hide that fat there.  “I don’t know.  How’s that?”  I asked.

“Better, it’s not so fat now,” my sweet Grand said.

My Grands notice everything.  When David was six years old, he and his two younger sisters crowded close as I read aloud.  With one Grand in my lap, and one on each side, I held the book high, front and center, so we could all see the pictures.  David, sitting beside me, rubbed his hand lightly down my arm.  With one finger, then two, and then his whole hand.  And then he patted under my arm right above my elbow.  “Gran, stop a minute,” he said.  “How do you get your arm to do that?”  He thumped that part of my arm that some people call a bat wing.  And he thumped his own underarm.  “Look.  When I do my arm like that it doesn’t jiggle.”  I immediately lowered my arms and the book.

“What?  I want to see,” said both his sisters.  I couldn’t convince them that the book was more interesting than a bat wing arm.  So we played show and laugh, and I silently swore that I’d never again lift my arms from my sides in public, unless I was wearing a sleeve below my elbow.

And then there’s a question that all my Grands have asked at age four.  Recently, Ruth and I sat on the playroom floor and dressed Strawberry Shortcake dolls.  We pretended that they smelled as they did when they were new, more than thirty years ago.  That’s when Ruth popped the question.  The same one that her older brother and sister had asked.  “Gran, is there a baby in your tummy?”  My reply was simple.  “No.”  And I’ve learned to not give explanation.

You know, if I’d lose a few pounds or grow about half an inch taller, I’d be an ideal weight according to most medical charts.  But somehow, my body bulges in places that it didn’t at this same weight twenty years ago.

I’m glad my Grands are observant and inquisitive.  Just not about my body.

 

 

Filed under: Everyday Life, Grandchildren | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a comment »

Woman Battles Pests

Posted on July 11, 2013 by susanrray

imagesI hate dandelions and TV commercials and flies.  I attack dandelions with vengeance.  I push a tool – one that looks like a long screwdriver and has two sharp points on the end – down beside dandelions and dig up the roots.  Now I know when dandelions seed, they’re fun for kids to blow and watch the feather-light seeds float in the air.  But not in my yard.

TV commercials are easy to avoid.  I record my favorite programs so I can fast forward through commercials.  The faster, the better.  And if I watch TV in real time, I hit the mute button during commercials. That leads to some creative thinking.  During a commercial for a laxative, a pair of red, spike-heeled, ladies shoes danced across the screen.  What’s the connection?

And then there are flies.  Like the one that buzzed over my head as I lay in bed ready to sleep.  And then it flew around the lamp on my bedside table.  I marked my place in the book I was reading and rolled up a magazine.  From my reclining position, I swatted the magazine every time Pesky Fly flew within arm’s reach.  Swatted left to right.  Forward and backward.  He won round one.  This was no ordinary housefly – maybe a horse fly.

I got out of bed and tromped to the utility room to get the fly swatter.  Pesky must have heard me coming back to the bedroom.  He was nowhere to be seen or heard as I stood in the middle of the bedroom with my weapon raised.  “Where’d he go?”  I asked Husband.  He shook his head and continued to read his espionage thriller book.  I climbed back in bed, read one page of my book, and heard the buzz coming from the lamp.  Do flies get energy when they circle light bulbs?  I threw off the covers, turned off the lamp, grabbed my fly swatter, and gave Husband instructions.  “Turn off your light.  I want that fly in the bathroom.”

Pesky followed me.  He buzzed past my head and near the brightly lit ceiling light.  I didn’t want a red bloodstain on the ceiling so I stood, fly swatter in hand, and waited.  He flew.  I swatted the air as he flew.  I swatted the vanity beside the sink.  I swatted high and low.  And then silence.  No sound or sight of Pesky.  I waited a minute or so.  Guess I’d unknowingly won the fight.

When I opened the bathroom door, Pesky flew over my shoulder into the bedroom.  Husband had turned on his bedside light and held his book in hand.  Pesky buzzed from one side of the room to the other, barely missing my head.  “I hate dandelions and TV commercials and flies!”  I said.  “It’s your turn!  I give up.”

By the time I settled under the bed covers and found the page in my book where I’d stopped reading, Husband swatted once and said, “Got him.  You must have worn him down.”  Yep, I’m sure that’s what happened.

Filed under: Everyday Life | Tagged: , , , | Leave a comment »

Grocery Shopping – It can be an Adventure

Posted on June 12, 2013 by susanrray

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Walking shoes, with orthotic inserts, laced and tied.  Car keys, purse, reusable shopping bags, coupons – all in hand.  Grocery list made and on my clipboard.  I was ready.  Or as ready as I’d ever be for senior citizen discount shopping day at the grocery store.

Once, years ago – long before I was eligible for a senior discount – I ran into this same grocery store to quickly pick up a few items.  I couldn’t get to the milk cooler because three grocery carts blocked them, and three gray-haired shoppers held tightly to their carts as they discussed their doctor appointments.  A conversation that convinced me to never shop this store on senior shopping day.  Until last week.

I really meant to shop on Tuesday, but somehow, Tuesday dwindled away.  And although I shop at several different grocery stores, only one carries the cottage cheese that my Grands and I like.  And I really hate to drive around town shopping here and there, especially on a rainy day.  I’m a task-oriented person when it comes to shopping.  Get it done and get out.  So I gave myself a pep talk.  ‘This is an adventure.  Something you’ve never intentionally done.  And everyone should do one new thing everyday.’

I eased my mini van into the store parking lot.  A long white sedan backed toward me.  I threw the gearshift into reverse, backed up, and avoided being hit.  A gentleman waved as he pushed a loaded grocery cart just two feet in front of my van.  The parking lot was as full as the one and only time I shopped on the day before Thanksgiving.  ‘Forget the cottage cheese!’ my brain screamed.  I inhaled.  ‘But you’re here and it’s an adventure – or maybe a risk.’  I parked, grabbed my paraphernalia, pulled my rain jacket hood over my head, and sloshed to the store’s open doors.

“Well, you look ready for the day!”  A store employee greeted me as he shuffled wet shopping carts into rows.  “The buggies are wet, but there’s plenty of paper towels to dry them.”  Oh, great.

Inside the store, I looked at the customers milling around the fresh produce.  They reminded me when my parents, both retired, decided to spend January in Florida.  After two weeks, they came home to Tennessee.  “There weren’t any kids near our apartment.  I never saw one school bus or one young family.  Just people as old as me,” Mother said.

I fit right in with the people at the grocery store.  I chatted with two friends I rarely see.  I visited with a former student, who was assisting his mother with her shopping.  When I realized my grocery cart was blocking a man’s view of birthday cards, I apologized and pulled my cart toward me.  “Oh, no.  It’s okay,” he said.  “I’m just perusing.  My wife is shopping.”  I moved at the pace of fellow shoppers.  And when I saw the 10% discount on my cash register tape, I gloated.

I like discounted prices – that’s why I bought six containers of cottage cheese.  Enough to last until the next senior shopping day.

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Filed under: Everyday Life, Food | Tagged: , , , | 3 Comments »

We All Need Help Sometimes

Posted on May 23, 2013 by susanrray

??????????????????????????????????????If I have lipstick on my teeth, please tell me.  If my sweater isn’t buttoned correctly or my tee shirt is wrong side out, I want to know.  One day last week while shopping and running errands around town, I greeted and talked with more than a dozen people, and then a friend pointed her finger toward her own teeth and simply said, “Lipstick.”  And often, I’ve quickly fastened just a couple of buttons on a cardigan sweater and walked out the door.  Never realizing that I look lopsided.

On my daughter’s wedding day, the florist called early that morning, before I was fully awake, and said that he couldn’t get in the church to decorate.  So I quickly jerked on the shorts and tee shirt I’d worn the day before.  A quick trip to church, unlock the door and come home, I thought.  But then, my cell phone rang as I turned the key in the church door, and the caterer asked that I come by her kitchen to discuss a last minute menu change.  And on the way home, I remembered that we needed a bag of ice so I stopped at the grocery.  When I arrived home, my son said, “Hey, Mom, do you know that your shirt is on backwards and wrong side out?”  There, right below my chin, a white tag hung on my dark green tee shirt.  Hopefully, that was my only fashion faux pas as mother of the bride.

I take comfort in knowing that I’m not the only one who pulls such stunts.  A teacher friend once wore one black shoe and one brown shoe to school.  No one in her family noticed before she left home, but the keen eye of a seven-year-old immediately spotted his teacher’s unusual attire.  The shoes were similar style, but different heel heights, which annoyed my friend all day and explained why she’d stumbled as she walked down the hallway.

A minister preached his first sermon, a trial sermon, wearing a brand new suit.  His delivery was perfect.  He raised his arms in praise, and he talked with his hands.  After shaking hands with every church member in attendance that Sunday morning, he took off his coat and saw the white manufacturer’s tag attached to his coat sleeve.  He was hired, anyway.

Today’s more casual fashions have wiped out some possible clothing mishaps.  Because we women often wear pants, we seldom hear the words, “You’re slipping,” code words for ‘Your slip is showing.’  But then ‘slipping’ probably doesn’t matter, because the undergarments my mother taught me shouldn’t show are now part of an outfit.  But I do have to remember to zip up my pants.

Lipstick on teeth.  Tee shirts backwards and wrong side out.  Unmatched shoes.  Tags dangling from clothes.  All mishaps.  I like the advice that I first heard from Mother.  If someone can fix something, tell her.  I truly don’t intend to have red polka-dotted teeth.  Just tell me, please.

 

 

Filed under: Clothes, Everyday Life | Tagged: , | 1 Comment »

Technology Smart Kids

Posted on April 11, 2013 by susanrray

      images      “Good Morning!” I said to my youngest Grand.  His mother passed her sleepy 20-month-old son from her arms to mine.

“Ish!  Ish!”  he said to me.

“Fish?”  I asked.  He nodded his head and looked around the room.  When he spotted my iPad, he repeated, “Ish!  Ish!”

While riding in the backseat of a car with my Grand for over an hour the previous day, I had opened my iPad to entertain him.  He quickly learned to place his finger on a floating circle on the iPad tablet screen and drag it to the fish’s mouth.  He laughed when the fish’s mouth opened wide to swallow the circle.  And that night, I showed him a concentration game, thinking he’d like the way the blank tiles flipped to show pairs of birds and toys and zoo animals that I’d match and then the tiles would disappear.  When only a few blank tiles remained, he pointed to the two that matched.  At first I thought it was by chance, but it wasn’t.  He purposely chose matching pictures several times, but his favorite iPad game was “ish.”

Every time my older Grands come to my house, they ask, “May I play your iPad?”  I set a timer for them to each have a 15-minute turn.  My book-loving Grand always chooses to ‘watch’ a read-aloud book.  The Photo Booth app gives my creative Grand a way produce swirl and mirror and kaleidoscope pictures.  My oldest Grand chooses video-type games.  After they play their just-for-fun games, I encourage them to play learning games.  Now, I know everybody’s child is an advanced technology student.  And that’s what intrigues me.  Youngsters know how to play games on tablets and computers like I knew how to stack blocks.

And today’s kids never tire of their games like my children never tired of PacMan, that yellow, circular, open-mouth character, but the PacMan jingle drove me crazy in the 1980’s.  That’s when my dad told me, “Now, Susan, when I was a kid, I was told to get my head out of a book.  And I told you not to listen to the radio and watch TV so much.  Now you think your kids are playing those video games too much.  Next generation, it’ll be something else.”

One little tyke learned to spell his last name because he wanted to use the new family tablet.  He repeatedly asked his mother the password for the iPad.  Finally, she said, “If you want to use it, you have to learn to spell the password.  It’s our last name, Resudek.”  The next day he announced to his preschool teacher that he’d learned to spell his last name.  His teacher listened as the proud little boy stood straight and tall and recited, “R E S U D E K -Enter!”

Enter…that’s what all our young ones are doing.  Entering life with passwords, computers, tablets, readers, smart phones, MP3 players – all sorts of technology.  That’s where we are.

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