Digital native

These days, there is a lot of talk about digital natives versus digital immigrants. As in, those that are born to it versus those that learn later in life. I am a digital immigrant. I only got a phone (and data plan) that could handle texting in any quantity because that's how my babysitters communicate. Now that I text I confess I really like it. But I had to be convinced.

Monkey and Jellybean, on the other hand, are bound to view texting as downright archaic by the time they demand their own phones: they are growing up with this technology and will never realize that life didn't always exist this way.

Kind of like when my mom would tell me the story of what a big deal it was when the first family in her neighborhood got a color TV. I was flabbergasted that TV had ever even existed in black and white! And somehow, putting a man on the moon always seemed like something that - of course! - we could do. Mind you I was born less than six months after that event...but to me, life had always been that way.

Jellybean is funny. Her temper tantrums in public almost always involve me denying her access to my phone or blackberry. When we were in DC back in December, we let her play with the DVD remote at the hotel because it didn't matter if she turned it on or off, it wasn't like the whole system would turn on (versus here, where we have one godwand with ALL the devices programmed into it). And even at one year of age, she'd hit a button, then turn and look at the TV expectantly...she knows how remotes work. (god I can hear myself now....Jellybean, I had to walk up hill both ways when I was a kid, and I even had to (the horrors!) get off my tush and go to the TV to change channels, can you believe it? Also, I had dinosaurs as pets, since I'm that old....)

Jellybean's love of all things electronic includes a blossoming love affair with the humidifier in our room. Even when we latch the door in a semi-closed position, she'll wiggle in between the door and the jamb, barely eeking through, so that she can go turn the humidifier on, then off, then on, then off....it's love, I tell you. In fact, anything that she can turn off or on is adored. And some toys? They're getting left behind....alas, no battery or electricity required.