Monday, September 11, 2017

You will pay attention to me now

My phone buzzes on the desk.

I am in the middle of writing something that I am terrified of forgetting, so I ignore it and keep on writing. By the time I am done writing, I have forgotten that my phone has buzzed and move on to something else.

My phone buzzes on the counter.

I am in the middle of playing Skip-Bo with my son before school. I am losing and am looking for an opportunity (any opportunity) to unload some cards from my well and not lose so badly. It is all in vain: I lose spectacularly; we go to school and I haven't checked my phone.

My phone buzzes in the car.

I am driving and listening to a podcast and tell myself I want to be the type of person who doesn't look at her phone when she drives. I figure I will answer it later when I get to work, even though I will probably forget to check it.

This is how my relationship with my phone goes. And I know that it frustrates some people who expect a faster response. And I recognize that I will inevitably become ultra-frustrated by this same behavior when my son one day has his own phone and doesn't answer my texts right away.

So, yeah, I totally admire the Dad who created an app that freezes your child's phone until they text you back. It ensures that the recipient of your message has to deal with your text before being able to do any other functions on their phone.

Of course it is not limited to use within families, and it could be used as a weapon by that crazy/needy friend or family member we all have, but I like the families that pledge to use it only when absolutely needed. We all need our child's attention sometimes.

What monitoring apps have you installed on your child's devices? Tell me in the comments.

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