New E-mail Account Here

Deanna's been asking for her own e-mail account. Apparently, all her classmates have them and she wanted to get in on the chatter. She talked with me about it, I pondered it for a few days, then presented it to Don.

My feeling is this: one day, in the not-too-distant future, she'll be gone and will be able to do whatever she wants. It's our job, while she's still at home, to train her and guide her into making wise decisions. That said, I told her that her father and I would have to have her password and WOULD be checking it to see who she was talking to and what was being said. There would be no obscene conversations, no chatting with ANYONE she didn't know well, and no Chat Rooms. And, she is not to give out any personal info. Her friends already know all that stuff about her, anyway.

She readily agreed. She's not trying to pull a fast one on us, she just wants to begin to grow up a little. Don was reluctant, which floored me. When the kids were little, I'd take them to McDonald's. If they were afraid of the slide, no big deal. They didn't have to do it. Don would take them and coax them, work with them, help them up the ladders, sometimes even slide down with them. I asked him about it one day.

"They need to push through things that frighten them a little," he told me. "It's okay to be afraid, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't do something." A good, sound, manly opinion. When it came to ourselves, I'm the daredevil and Don's the cautious one. With our children, I'm the molly-coddler, he's the "push them a little to overcome their fears and weaknesses" one.

He's always done that with the children. So, his reaction to allowing Deanna this little freedom surprised me.

"I'm just not sure it's wise, hon," he told me. "What do YOU think?"

"I think we need to begin to let her grow up while we can monitor her choices," I responded.

His concerns were two-fold: he doesn't want to let his daughter grow up just yet (my words, not his), and he says it's difficult to set up e-mail accounts since BellSouth merged with AT&T. But he also didn't seem to be in any big rush to try.

I told Deanna about my conversation with her father. She waited a few days and talked with him again. No response. A few more days and another conversation. No response. After repeating this pattern for a couple of weeks, she got frustrated on Saturday night and appealed to me.

"Mom, can't I set up a Google account? My friends all say it's real easy."

I finally decided we were both tired of waiting on Don and I might as well let her try. She was successful. Last night, after she had spent several hours chatting with her friends, I went onto her account and read the comments and smiled to myself.

They consisted of such important commentary as, "The Colts are gonna win"; "Hey, Dude"; "I luv your 'likes' list"; "You're so funny"; :) ; etc. - pretty innocent.

I realize that doesn't always mean they'll be innocent, but she's having a blast with it so far. She told me about a 4-way conversation she had with three of her girlfriends. She feels like "one of the crowd" a little bit now, something Deanna's never much felt.

I'm pleased that it worked out but will continue to monitor her. It's easy to slip into a problem without even realizing and I don't want that to happen. But I DO trust her and think she's old enough to begin judging some of those things for herself.