We have four laptops. For three people. Granted, two of these are owned by our places of work, but still… We spend a lot of time on the computer. More than I would like.
I didn’t use a computer until my last year in high school. We had two TV channels with limited programming. My parents didn’t have to worry about limiting “screen time.”
As parents in the 21st century, we have a host of new decisions to make. We are navigating uncharted parenting territory. Do we allow Facebook? Do we get a Wii? How much time should our children spend in front of the computer? What are the long-term effects of spending time in a virtual world?
I have a sneaking suspicion that we’ll wake up one day and exclaim:
Why did we spend our lives in front of a screen rather than experiencing life at its fullest with family and neighbors around a shared table, working for a better world, creating art and music, and spending time in nature?
This Christmas Day, my family will take a break from our computers. We will pack them up and stow them away for a day. We will look each other in the eyes, talk, laugh, nap, read, play games, eat leftovers, sing, and enjoy each other. It’s a start…
Merry Christmas!
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