Words are made of letters....letters are made of words

The other night I asked my son if he knew where the remote control had disappeared.

"I D K. My BFF Jill?" was his response.

I looked at him and blinked. Repeatedly.

The fact that I even knew what he was saying kinda disturbed me...almost as much as his believing that the answer was helpful in any way.

The kids are speaking a different language today...it happens.

In fact, I was talking to a teen yesterday and they said to me (as they were leaving)..."I'll send you a text message!"

"Okay! Thank you!" I called back...thinking, Why in heaven's name would I want one? Hm...I mean...I D K about text messages....

Another teen (I saw A BUNCH OF THEM yesterday, okay?) mentioned that they were up at 4 a.m. text messaging their girlfriend.

Information I did not need to know!!

I got out my soapbox.

The teen asked me what on earth that thing was.

I ignored the teen and began to preach about the damaging effects of text messaging vs. writing.

"How personal can that be?" I asked. "You know what you need? You need to write her a good love note!"

The teenager blinked.

Repeatedly.

"A wha?"

Suddenly I felt like I was 189 years old! "Back in the 'good ol days'....see....we had this incredible stuff called "paper". You could do all sorts of things with it...it was cheap...why...everybody had some! Some drew on it...others made incredible paper flyin' machines....but what I liked to do with paper was write on it. Of course, you need a pen or a pencil to do that. And you gotta be careful! If you don't use them properly, you could put an eye out! You ever wrote anything?"

Honestly (sighing heavily now), because I'm blogging...you can see for yourself that I'm part of the technological age. But still...I'm telling you...just like low fat ice cream....some things just should not have substitutes.

And a love letter is a wonderful thing.

I was a senior in high school. And so was he. And I got grounded. Now that particular story is for another time....but suffice it to say that I wasn't allowed to leave the house (except for school) and I couldn't have friends over (which included boyfriends....sigh). For a week.

So...at school, my boyfriend and I came up with a plan. There was this big ol' tree in my backyard. He would leave notes there for me in the morning...and I would leave notes for him there in the afternoon and he'd pick them up after work.

It was the longest week of my life.

It was also one of the best.

I still have one of those letters. It says so much good stuff that I re-read it occasionally. I just can't throw it away.

Text messaging is very convenient...but nothing says "I Love You" like writing "I Love You" on a good ol' piece of looseleaf. You can look at it again...and again...and again.

Letters are powerful stuff.

Recently I wrote a letter to someone. And they wrote their own letter to someone. Imagine what might happen to folks if we all took the time to write a letter to someone and tell them how much they mean to us?

I think some very cool things might happen. I'm willing to try it....are you?

And if you say, "I D K",....um....I'm sorry...but I might have to smack you with my Trapper Keeper notebook! BFF or not...!