Young adolescents prefer not to delay gratification. For me as a young adolescent, the telephone was the preferred means of communication, particularly with gal-peers. If I wanted to ask a gal-peer to a dance, it was a whole lot easier for me telephone her at home than it was to catch her at school not surrounded by an audience of unsympathetic onlookers. Even if it was less serious than a school dance, I usually preferred the telephone. For three gal-peers I never even dated and my two closest guy-friends, I’m confident I logged over five hundred hours on the telephone with each of them before I graduated from high school.
The digital age has brought new mediums of communication to my kids’ generation. Chloe cannot wait for us to get her a mobile telephone. Philip has had his mobile phone for almost two years now. But the big difference for this new generation is the mediums of written correspondence: Email, text messaging, instant messaging and wall-posts. I can picture Jane Austen and Cyrano de Bergerac watching this generation from Beyond with great interest.
Philip has entered the world of digital written correspondence slowly and cautiously. When he first got his mobile phone in the seventh grade, Philip traded only a few text messages with a gal-peer with whom he had done some babysitting. For a while during eighth grade he was trading regular texts with one of his guy-friends. But that dropped off significantly when we explained to Philip that some parents reserve the right to view all their kids’ digital correspondences.
Two months ago, Philip put up a page on Facebook and began connecting with his peers, particularly his peers from Hermes Middle School who he expects to see again next year at Hermes High School. Philip’s correspondence on Facebook is slowly building. A gal-peer who once lived across the street “throws” a virtual pillow at him every other week or so. Various peers comment on his status and place posts on his “wall” where parents and peers alike can see.
Recently Jocelyn joined the list of those who are connected to Philip on Facebook and she began trading messages with him. Jocelyn began with a teen-sounding greeting and he responded in kind. Eventually, however, she put a post on his wall asking him to do her a small favor. It was a simple enough favor, but one that circumstances prevented him from granting. Suddenly, Philip was out of his element. He didn’t want to say “no” and he didn’t want to ignore her, but he was challenged to put into words the proper reply.
Having seen Jocelyn's request on Philip's wall and knowing it was something he couldn’t grant, I asked him if he had replied off-wall. He hadn’t. It was one of those potentially awkward father-son interactions that could misfire if I did not tread cautiously. But Philip proved quick to volunteer that he wanted to respond but didn’t know what to say. And that opened the door for me to offer help. In amazingly short order, he accepted the wisdom of email over the wall as the venue via which to respond. The email we (mostly me) composed (i) acknowledged the need and the legitimacy of Jocelyn's request, (ii) explained the conflict this time around, (iii) offered to grant the same favor when possible if needed in the future, (iv) thanked Jocelyn for something similar she had done for Philip in the past and (v) closed with some normal teen-sounding chat acknowledging the email was a little long.
My only disappointment with Philip was that he barely challenged my recommended wording and did not want to alter my proposed structure in the slightest. Instead he pasted the text into Facebook's email tool, read it over one last time, changed the smiley face from ": - )" to "= }" and pressed the send key. "If Jocelyn ever asks you if one of your parents helped you compose this email, I suggest you say 'yes'," was as scathing as I would get about it.
I wonder what Cyrano would think. I'm also curious to know what Jocelyn thinks. But if she responds by email, I may never know. I'm not one of those parents who demands access to my son's digital correspondance.
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