North Star Writers Group

I read everything. Always have. I remember one specific road trip from Ohio to Texas to visit my grandparents when I was six. I’d just gotten really good at reading, and decided – the entire way there – to read every sign, license plate and billboard I could.

I think we got all the way to Arkansas before my poor dad, insanely tired from hearing “rest stop ahead,” and “JUV-873” finally yelled at me to stop. What a patient man.

Today, the habit’s still there. I happened to read in a training manual (I read the whole manual. The instructor was – indeed – that boring!) that 75 percent of automobile buyers now come into car dealerships with informational printouts. Effectively, the salesman is no longer of the same use to them when it comes to knowing the basics.

When I bought my first car, there was no Internet, and save for the knowledge of what little I had in my bank account, I was clueless.

So, in this particularly boring training session, my mind couldn’t help but wonder. What effect this is going to have on my parenting? My oldest son is 13 months old. When he needs something, or has a problem, is he going to come to me with a printout from the Internet?

“Mom, listen, I know you think that kisses, a cool washcloth and chicken noodle soup is the answer. But it says right here that I’m also going to require more lemon in my water, as well as a fever-reducing agent every two hours.”

During that same meeting, I happened to grab a stash of tea bags from the scary depths of the bottom drawer of my desk. And right on the box, I was promised, and I quote, to “be taken back to bedtime chats in warm woolen slippers, to snow-laded window sills and glimpses into the golden-lit haven of family kitchens.”

Huh? I pondered this bit of reading as well. First, I’m not sure one can be “taken back” to a place in which one has never been. In reality, I suppose a cup of tea could take me back to nights spent hiding in my attic bedroom, listening to my trouble-making brother get yelled at, while I pretended to be doing my homework. Rather than a golden-lit haven, our kitchen was a lot more like mine is today.

Perhaps if my son becomes as much a writer as a reader some day, he can write statements like this. He can work for the cereal folks. “Let this bowl of Cheerios take you back to five-minute breakfasts while mommy searched for matching heels, running through the kitchen from front to back closet, fervently reminding you how much she loves you while hopping, one shoe finally on, towards your high chair for that last morning good-bye kiss.”

I’d also like to think that he’ll know that “snow-laden” and “golden-lit haven” don’t go in the same sentence. At least, not in states like Michigan, where we live, and where snow is equated with more of a grayish overcast.

I tried to re-engage in my training, but not long later, still stuck in the same colorless conference room, my eyes wandered to an ad in the magazine the guy next to me was coyly reading. And it was all about the latest and greatest, again I quote, “handheld solution.”

My thoughts arrived again at my little son. Handheld solutions used to mean cordless phones, like the one the size of my head that still resides in my basement. Today, that oh-so-creative and meaningful description means something a little smaller – iPods and such.

I can only hope that by the time my son grows up, that phrase is still being used by copywriters and publicity folks everywhere. Because if it’s held in his hand, that means it hasn’t been micro-chipped into his wrist. Or permanently scanned into his brain through his retina.

It will mean that while sources of information and cheesy wording on food boxes will have changed, one thing will not have changed. The information in his head will be only what he lets in, and not what others impose on him.

Others.

Like this guy who’s trying to train me right now, and whose knowledge I’ve willingly given up for a few minutes to think about my baby boy while I can’t be with him.

Today, that’s my version of fair trade.

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This is Column # CD056. Request permission to publish here.