Girl Talk

Last night after dinner my daughters both decided it was time for one of their specialties. Chatting.

My older daughter had a cell phone that used to be my husband's. It's no longer charged or connected, so a long time ago it went into the toy box and has been one of the so very many little phones that we have around the house.

As it happens, my younger daughter was at that time playing with her new princess cell phone. Since my oldest wanted that pink phone, she asked to trade. When she was met with a curt "no" from her younger sister, she upped the ante.

"This one has like 8900 movies on it! Don't you want it?!" she said with excitement, holding up the old silver phone with no flashing lights or noises. And yes, she really said eight thousand nine hundred.

First off, I have to marvel at the fact that our kids these days are playing with toy cell phones. Back in our day I'm pretty sure we played with pretend rotary phones, and we were damn excited about them. And if they made sounds or had lights that was a serious upgrade, a phone with which to be reckoned. I mean they weren't even cordless for crying out loud.

Fast forward to today. Nowadays our phones are so savvy that they even play movies. And that's just a normal thing in the world of today's children. Movie-playing, music-rocking, weather-checking, text-sending, google-ready, multi-colored cell phones.

Where is this world headed in our lifetime? How about in theirs?

Okay, back to the story. So my oldest apparently made an offer that couldn't be refused and her younger sister snapped that old boring cell phone out of her hands and gave up the pretty pink phone in exchange.

Then each of them proceeded to chat on their phones for a while. My younger one had a mostly mish-mash conversation with lots of correct phrases in incorrect places. And a few incorrect phrases too. But she looked so cute chattering away on the phone and rolling her eyes around, it didn't really matter.

My older daughter had a conversation with her imaginary friend in which she was so excited because her friend was at graduate school and she was telling her all about it. She's chatting along and then suddenly she says "Hold on a second, I have a call on the other line."

Then she clicks a button and answers the other "call". After a couple of "uh-huh"s and "really?"s she clicks back over to her friend and exclaims that she is going to go to graduate school too, and she starts squealing for joy.

Thatta girl; gotta love the imaginary play that revolves around higher education.

I just watched in amazement as all this panned out. And I thought about how this scene, of the two of them chatting away on their cell phones, was exactly what I was going to be seeing in 8 or 9 years, but with actual people on the other end of the line. And actual cell phones that are going to cost us some moolah.

Of course we are already getting a taste of this girl talk in our house. My almost 7 year old's friends have started calling up the house from time to time to say hi, or to ask for a playdate or a sleepover. Never mind that it's usually completely the wrong time for their requests, as in right before dinner time or bed time.

A lot of the time their parents aren't even aware that they are calling my child. And these kids, including my own, aren't very well versed in conversation etiquette either. There's a lot of long pauses and unanswered questions. I know this because my daughter likes to talk on the speaker phone. It drives me a little crazy sometimes and I have to move the conversation along or make sure that my daughter is at least being polite and paying attention to the person on the other end of the phone.

It's actually gotten to the point in our house that my daughter now jumps for the phone when it rings. She really jumps.

Seriously? Are we here already?

She only answers it when she sees that it's someone she knows, usually my husband or one of a couple of friends that call. But I'm not liking it when I go for the phone and realize she is on the other end, not saying anything, just listening in as I chat with her friends' parents.

Since when do I have to fight for the phone around here?

Since when is everything all about her?

Call me later and we can chat about it.

But be prepared to be screened by a precocious 6 year old that may or may not actually say "hello" when she answers the phone.