<p>Curmudgeon,</p>
<p>I agree with SBmom and a number of others. Don’t stop posting. It would be like walking out in the middle of Rudy or similar film. I like to read the positive news. I get enough of the other on network television.</p>
<p>Personally I read the sports page first. I subscribe to the following quote from former Chief Justice Earl Warren:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Though with the change in society it is not as true as it used to be. :-(</p>
<p>Regardless, keep posting.</p>
<p>Curmy,
Even though I don’t often post in threads like this, I do read them and love to follow them. You are not bragging, just reporting sports news that my local paper in the mid-Atlantic states has forgotten to print! As the mother of 3 totally unathletic boys, I love reading about other “friends” kids’ accomplishments on the court. I suppose I couldn’t get onto the “private” list at this point to get updates?</p>
<p>I’ll add my plea that you continue posting detail, too. Even if I don’t make the effort to jump in and say congrats, I read every post you write that I happen into. It would be a great loss if all the fun disappeared into PM, very disappointing. Putting the detail into PM deprives those of us who did not complain, or express objection.</p>
<p>Agree with all the above!!!</p>
<p>hayden LOL #100</p>
<p>
You’ll be surprised at what a comfort this board might be to you when you join the ranks of the empty-nesters. I mean… if your d. is one of those busy, “I’ve got a life” types who flies far away to college and never seems available to answer a call, so that your entire view of her college life comes down to whatever you are able to discern from her away messages, it will seem very nice to come to this board and at least find people still interested in communicating with you.</p>
<p>
you mean I’m not the only one? :o</p>
<p>We’re blessed. Our daughter has very detailed and frequently-updated away messages. :)</p>
<p>driver - ditto here. DS asked me why I liked his away messages so much. Sometimes they’re almost poetic, always they smack of his personality. And, as I told him, they’re a <em>lot</em> more talkative than he is. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>I’m actually saving them in a Word document. well, the ones that don’t have x-rated vocabulary.</p>
<p>Stop rubbing it in with tales of wonderful D’s who actually turn ON IM. </p>
<p>Away messages. Good one.</p>
<p>After two weeks of nada, I got a two sentence email. Something about S1 going through a period of disorganization and a ‘misplaced’ phone. Quotation marks his. </p>
<p>*congrats to cur and mudgee-yette (That’s how they pronounce it in the South). I bet cur’s wet pants will be a weekly feature. Through May 1st at least. Anyone else wanna bet?</p>
<p>all the posters from calmom on down,(cheers, jmmom, driver) is it really that bad? LOL. CC and IM and collecting away messages? That sounds so…so…awful. :(</p>
<p>Note to self: tie allowance amount to calls home .</p>
<p>It’s that bad.</p>
<p>I believe I mentioned the sole phonecall I got from S for the first 3 months of his college experience this fall, which lasted about 30 seconds and went roughly, “Hi Mom, I’m in the athletic center signing up, should I list you as my emergency contact? Yes? OK thanks, bye!” (Leaving me to ponder whom else might have been an appropriate emergency contact, LOL!)</p>
<p>Mine has AIM on all the time, but does not insert meaningful away messages. So all I know is that his computer still has power and is still turned on in his room. That’s it.</p>
<p>Sometimes, two days after my most recent IM to him (which went unanswered at the time), there’ll be a sudden pop-up from him saying, “Yes, that’s right.” But I have no earthly clue what the last thing I asked him about was, so I have no idea what his response means. And then when I ping him back asking him to refresh my memory, he’s already gone again.</p>
<p>The first few months were unspeakably hard, coping with his absence in so many senses of the word. Now I’m mostly used to it. (Sigh…)</p>
<p>It might be worse. </p>
<p>The “away message” thing might be passe. Worked for my son way back when. But AIM might be replaced by gmail chat and myspace.com. </p>
<p>The money for phone calls trick works only for big-spending kids who need the bucks. Your ranch-raised d. may fall into the category of hard-working and frugal… those kids manage to do just fine without your $$. If she ends up accepting one of those full ride offers being tossed at her, you’re doomed – kids like that end up with the weird idea that they are in charge of their own lives. The things you would most like to know get mentioned in passing, months or even years after the fact. </p>
<p>Mudgette’s an only, right? I used to get some of the skinny on what was going on with my son by quizzing his sister.</p>
<p>The first semester S1 was gone, I thought I would die. Period.</p>
<p>It has gotten marginally better, but there’s still not enough real info coming through. You miss so much of the communication when it’s not in person: all the body language, facial expression, quiet sighs, etc. It’s much harder to determine, for instance, if complaining is just grumpiness or has substance that should be addressed.</p>
<p>Mootmom, I hear ya. Bigtime. Just be grateful you haven’t been on the receiving end of the “emergency contact” phonecall.</p>
<p>OK. Mom of girl raises hand. Said girl IMs me at least once, sometimes twice, a day. Leaves various away messages - today it was Death to Mol Bio, but just as often it is shower, dinner, Frist or something of the sort. Calls me from her cell when she is walking across campus. Gives me detailed information on how she plans her day, where she might eat dinner, and which friend at any given moment is driving her nuts or making her happy.</p>
<p>Pretty much similar to how it was when she was 8. I talk to her more now than I did when she was home, because then I didn’t have her IM…Used to be I would get home late, she was doing homework, she would emerge briefly, I would go to bed. Used to be I had to take her for a pedicure to get a real conversation in.</p>
<p>Guess there’s a spectrum and we are on the talky end.</p>
<p>Alumother, I have a talky daughter too. She talks at least 4 hours on the phone every night with her boyfriend, and every day when she arrives home from school she walks in the front door with the cell phone glued to her ear and the bf on the other end. So I do think she will probably be very good about communicating with said bf when she goes off to college next year. </p>
<p>I suppose I’ll get a call if and when they ever break up.</p>
<p>Cur, (courtesy of Sonny & Cher):
Baby don’t go,
Pretty baby please don’t go
I love you so,
Pretty baby please don’t go</p>
<p>You have a lot of knowledge and advice to pass on the current juniors. (Will guilting you into staying work?) Plus we’ll miss your unique wit. I’ve avoided getting enmeshed in this thread but decided I couldn’t let it go any longer.</p>
<p>And yes, it’s that bad. I too have a somewhat uncommunicative son. He swears he reads all my emails, he just doesn’t respond to all of them. He does try to call every 10 days or so. And Mootmom is right, you do (sort of) get used to it. </p>
<p>I’d love to get the sports PM too. I have rather unathletic boys but I go to all the high school games. I do get to cheer occasionally at science competitions! </p>
<p>Good luck with everything!</p>
<p>Note to self: tie allowance amount to calls home </p>
<p>Money did cause our son to call home once …uuuuhhh, I forgot that I need to get X dollars for my Visa…as in Travel Visa…by tomorrow, ooops. </p>
<p>But mainly money means nada. We don’t send allowance but lets face it his expenses are largely covered by what we take care of…He doesn’t spend anything. He isn’t jealous of kids with credit cards or trust funds around him…plenty of need scholarship types around, too. He doesn’t have a car. He is living on joy, new friends and a zillion new interesting people he interacts with daily. Our homebody is an extrovert, who knew. In the information age, these kids are bombarded with communication outlets with peers. </p>
<p>IM works nicely for some RBPOCF Recently Bereaved Parents of College Freshmen who are parent-pals of mine. (My S would find this close to being a horror scene if I monitered his Away messages.) Some kids also are chatty on the phone on almost a daily basis and it means absolutely nothing re their level of independence–it is only an indication of their comfort with their parents that is rather impressive, enviable and not at all necessarily clingy. Each family seems to find their own comfort zone. </p>
<p>or is it each freshman sends out vibes about their comfort zones and we parents adapt. yes, that is more what it is. I do dimly realize that if I did know the event of the day or the issue of the day, no amount of phone calls is going to put me back in S’s day to day world, so it really does come down to getting some separation work done. </p>
<p>I read his college paper daily…maybe that will also stop someday…OK>.I have asked if he was attending this event or that lecture once or twice…even though well…ick! (I would hate for my parents to have had access to my college daily calendar and then been nagging me on “don’t miss this or that!”) </p>
<p>Oh well…working it out, working on it.<br>
My biggest comfort was meeting the other freshmen Parent’s Weekend… and realizing that S had a new circle of hard-working and intriguing young people around him daily for support and companionship. And Alumother…you are lucky to have such effortless ease on cell chats with your D…I do see that this is very true in many families. We work well with weekly long visits on the phone and otherwise, resisting the urge to call.</p>
<p>Yep, talky end here too. Especially with daughter. But son is also very talky, especially during football season when there are lots of aches and pains. Daughter will be yaking to older sis and little bro who are upstairs on the laptop and will be on the phone with me all at the same time. Usually all arguing about a new pair of jeans she wants to buy! She shares an account with her little brother (the miser of the family) and he NEVER agrees with her buying anything. And it goes on and on…</p>
<p>But everytime I hang up, I so miss my baby girl. And since her leaving in August I catch myself wishing she would transfer closer to home. Selfish I know. I keep it to myself and secretly hope she might.</p>
<p>Kat</p>
<p>Kat - I hope you have a wonderful summer with your D at least.</p>
<p>Here’s another my kid is off to college question for you all. So, although I am still hearing details from D, one thing that has completely fallen by the wayside is family dinners. D loved to eat as a family. S really would love to eat as a family only if the family involved had Bobby Knight as the grandad, Coach K as the Dad, Adam Morrison as the brother (anyone who follows college bball knows who these people are, or if you don’t follow it but have an obssessed soul in your house too…). So no more dinners. Well, I mean, food is consumed but at varying times etc.</p>
<p>Mootmom, I remember you are a dinner hero. Do the dinners continue now that S1 is gone?</p>