Yesterday we got to iChat with Enoch , Tania and Natalie. It was fun. It was my first iChat, and also the girls’ first time. I’d seen Ted do a bit here and there for work – peering through his glass office doors I’d spy him conversing with his Powerbook screen – so now I understand a little more what he does all day.
Elisabeth is nearly the same age as Natalie and she was excited by the sight of a little friend, pointing at the screen, waving, and trying to touch her. Natalie offered her milk to our kids, holding her sippy cup up to the camera, and demonstrated some favorite toys. We sat on stools in the kitchen, laptop on the countertop, trying to fit into the square of screen, taking turns. Abigail and Michaela enjoyed seeing and sharing.
The girls will grow up with iChat in the same way that they are growing up with blogs, cell phones and CDs. They will be unaware of life without these technologies. They’ll be unaware that Mommy once talked on telephones with long kinky cords, scribbled in a private paper diary, and danced to vinyl LPs of Winnie the Pooh played on the family record player when she was five years old.
I don’t think I’d seen Enoch or Tania for ten years. We had a few technical difficulties but it was still a lot of fun. It was the first time we’d seen each other’s children, and the first face-to-face (via iChat) meeting for our little girls. I think we’ll probably be doing it again 🙂
