Really-- this is all we have to talk about?

I'm listening to a story on the "Today Show" about a J. Crew ad in which a photo shows a woman playing with her 5 year-old son -- by painting her son's toe nails hot pink. So far they've spent more than 5 minutes on a supposed controversy over the appropriateness of the image. They have "experts" talking about whether this represents some kind of blurring of gender roles which will impact this child and other children who see this image, requiring psychotherapy later in life. They've spent more time talking about this "controversy" than discussing the burget and federal deficit. Really? What I see is a photo of a woman playing with her delighted child. Playing. Not lecturing, beating, berating or abandoning, but playing. And all those people who find the image offensive must have way too much time on their hands. Talk about over-thinking! It's an ad. It's one image. Don't buy from J. Crew if it bugs you that much. And don't assume that what offends you will in some way undermine the morals of the rest of the world. Play with your kids, hug them, tell them you love them-- and paint their toenails every color of the rainbow!

My biggest fear...

I think I just figured out what my biggest fear is... or at least one of my biggest fears. My husband has said often that becoming a parent makes him vulnerable in ways he could never have imagined before having children. As a parent, the thought of your child getting hurt-- physically or emotionally-- is more wrenching than any perceived pain of your own. So we try to protect our kids: we buckle them into car seats, keep small chokeable toys out of their mouths, put helmets on their heads and nets around their trampolines... anything we can do to add one more layer of protection. Yet, many of us same parents give our kids, some as young as 8 or 9, instant access to a big and potentially harmful world. We give them a cell phone. No seatbelt, no helmet, no net. It used to be that people who prey on kids had to actually physically be near kids to cause real harm. A pedophile had to go to a playground or school yard for his fix. These days he can simpy log on and reach out from the comfort of his own home via Facebook or chatrooms or IMs... all of which have geo-location software that can identify where their prey lives, goes to school, hangs out with his or her friends. And in an awful lot of cases, the predator doesn't have to go to find his prey-- rather, it comes to him. I just watched the trailer for David Schwimmer's new film, "Trust." Since I was unable to watch the entire trailer without crying, I don't think I'll be able to go see the actual film. The premise is familiar: a cute, smart, athletic girl entering high school and feeling socially awkward strikes up an on-line relationship with someone who claims to be a high school junior in a faraway state. When they inevitably meet in person, he of course turns out to be something much different-- and the resulting fallout is terrifying. The girl's life and that of her family and friends is changed forever-- and not in a good way. My middle-school daughter took a phone to school today. It's a simple, not-so-smart phone. She and her friends would like to go to the season-opening high school softball game after school. The weather's not great, and it may not happen, and she may need to get a hold of me so I can pick them up early. Cell phones are useful that way. My daughter has been nagging us for a phone of her own since 4th grade. We got this particular phone earlier this year when that same daughter went away with her friend for a week. We realized that we wouldn't be able to reach her while she was away-- she went with a friend whose parents are deaf and there were no phones in the house where they were staying. We took the phone back when she returned. Most of her friends have phones; most of those phones are Internet-enabled "smart phones." Most of her friends are on Facebook (and they had to lie to set up their pages since all of her friends are under 13.) Most of her friends are texting each other and posting Facebook updates for anyone who will respond from the minute they get on the bus to the second they enter school -- where, in theory, they're not supposed to have their phones out. My daughter has acknowledged the rudeness of it all: as she tries to actually talk to a friend, that friend stops in mid-sentence to respond to a third friend's text. It annoys my daughter, and it should. But that hasn't stopped her from wanting to be able to do the same thing. My husband and I are trying to delay this foray into the unfettered on-line world for as long as we can. She has an e-mail address which comes into our e-mail in-box. She uses Skype and ooVoo with her friends, and we periodically check the conversations. But it's impossible for us to keep track of even those interactions every day. We hope we're giving her the tools to make good decisions on-line, but how will we really know? My biggest fear is that the technology will win. That my child will figure out just how easy it is to set up an e-mail account or Facebook account on her own; how easy it is to attract "friends" on-line whether they are acquaintaces or strangers; and how easy it would be to meet those new-found friends and put herself in harm's way without her parents having a clue. We won't be giving her a phone any time soon. She thinks we're too strict, too over-bearing, too technologically unsophisticated. We won't let her ski without a helmet, and, for now, we won't let her out of the house technologically by herself. We're too afraid.