I Could See the Future (and My Past)

Last night as we were herding putting the girls to bed the phone rang - the home phone. This in itself is not an odd thing as that thing on the wall often makes noise, but this time it stopped and then started again immediately which is a pretty good sign that someone must really need to talk with us. The second round of incessant ringing usually prompts one of us to actually walk over and answer it (or at least look at caller ID more seriously). I hear Josh answer and then hand the phone to The Boy. I was a little dumbfounded as it wasn't his birthday so why would anyone call and immediately ask to speak with him? Cute and funny story so far, right? Well here is where it gets sad . . . my son has ZERO phone etiquette. Instead of simply saying "hello," he says "is this Sam*"? Josh and I stood motionless as we watched him bumble through this initial exchange and then some silly I am eight and talking on the phone nonsense." (*not his real name)

Once the laughing ended they were able to get down to business and it turns out these boys are working on a project together and needed to chat about some changes to their Dred Scott presentation. Amazingly the giggling continued and for the life of me I can't figure out what is so funny about 1) homework, 2) PowerPoint presentations, 3) Supreme Court rulings, or 4) pre-Civil War history; but then I am not in the 3rd grade. The Boy then proceeded to spend 30 minutes on the phone with his buddy while they searched for pictures and factoids to add to their project.

I snapped the picture soon after he got comfortable in front of the computer because I felt the need to capture when it all began. I wanted to be able to look back on January 16, 2013 as when talking on the telephone with friends began for him because when I look back on my childhood that is a HUGE part of what I remember. I don't think we talked about Dred Scott unless there was cute boy in one of my classes with that name and we sure didn't discuss changes to our PowerPoint presentation but times have changed as the old folks (like me) say.