HRU, LOL, KIT & HAND

Let the games begin.

Our house is officially on the market.

I found that out a few days ago when my 13-year old daughter texted me a picture of the brand new “For Sale” sign now planted in our front lawn.

She titled it OMG.

My daughter has become quite good at texting.

And quite good at abbreviations too.

It is the spelling that has me concerned.

Luv.  U.  Ur.  Sez.  Thx.  L8.  Wut r u up 2?

Oh boy.

Somewhere Webster is burning his dictionary.

The world of text slang has become quite the rage.

And some of it can be wkewl, I mean way cool. 

When I did a search for a list, I found literally hundreds of ways to misspell words.

And a different acronym for every day of the yr. 

For example...

*$=Starbucks

d/c=disconnected

w’s^=what’s up

404 means I haven’t a clue.    

Which is perfect, because I haven’t a clue how you get I haven’t a clue out of 404.

Someday you may get a text that says TYCLO.

That means its time to Turn Your CAPS LOCK Off.

And who could live without PITMEMBOAM.

Any guesses?

Well the correct answer is, Peace In the Middle East My Brother Of Another Mother.

Seriously.  

If texting becomes an Olympic sport, my family may just have a medalist.

In both speed and quantity.

My daughter texts so much... 

...we got her the unlimited plan and she still went over.

That was E123.  Easy as 1, 2, 3.

But we really did get her the unlimited plan.

She and her friends text every day and I’m thrilled to say that I am still one of them.

It may sound impersonal or a good way to become d/c, but I think of it the opposite way.

Ultimate optimist that I am.

The way I look at it, between Skype and email and texting and dare I say, calling, we have four chances to stay in touch.

The reality is as much as I would like to speak with them every day, that’s just not realistic.

But texting, now that’s another story.

My goal is to have one line of communication with them every day, any type of communication.

And so far so good.

But sometimes its still not enough.

With each day that passes, I miss them more and it sounds like they are missing me as well.

This is what the text exchange between my daughter and I looked like yesterday:

Her:  How have you been?

Me:    I miss you A LOT, but I am doing fine.   How are you?

Her:   I miss u 2.  we r doing well.  (My brother) was sick yesterday but he is better now, (my sister) starts soccer 2morrow & i have my first dance competition in 7 weeks.  (My sister) is doin her state report on new york.  it has been tough w/o u here, but we r hangin on.

Me:   Hang in there the best you can.  This is the hardest part, but I am counting the minutes until I see you.   You are going to love it here.

I learned a few things from this latest exchange.

I learned that my punctuation is better than hers.

I learned that my grammar is better than hers.

I learned that my spelling is better than hers.

But I also learned that we are both hurting.

Actually I already knew it, but this was another reminder.

It was also a reminder of all the things that I am missing.

Our exchange seemed so basic at first, but when I went back and read the texts again, as I always do, the part where she said they are “hangin on” hit me hard.

Made me sad, actually.

I realize this is a temporary moment in our life and they realize it too.

And we both know that me getting a job was the best thing that we ever could’ve hoped for.

No matter where it was.

But after being at home for as long as I was, and getting to know each other as well as we did, being apart really sucks.

Whoever came up with this whole thing about absence making the heart grow fonder probably didn’t live thousands of miles away from their wife and kids.

Then again, they probably didn’t have Skype.

Or a cell phone.

Or unlimited texting.