The Internet: A 4th Grader's perspective

Sophie got a pretty, pink Dell laptop for Christmas last year.(Considering what her daddy does for a living, the idea of her not being tech savvy is a little shameful, really). When it arrived, Kevin overhauled the darn thing, installing parental controls and additional security measures to keep her safe. Frankly, it was almost more of a hassle to Google "Nocturnal Amphibians" for a book report than it was to just drive the three bloody miles to the library and open up an encyclopedia. Fort Knox probably has less security.


In any event, over time, we've had to loosen up some of the controls to make the computer usable...assuming we ever wanted her to be able to visit anything other than the Disney site or Build-A-Bear site...we had no choice. As a result, she's been left traumatized by a million things I hadn't considered. Here's our current list....(I say current because its still in progress and, yes, she is totally monitored on the computer by her father and I, not to worry!):


1. Chupacabra: I'd never heard of this thing. Its some kind vampiric, hairless dog-like kangaroo that runs around killing farm animals. According to a Yahoo article, one of them had been caught in Texas, or so Sophie had heard. I told her it didn't exist and not to worry about it. She spouted off a few details about sightings, locations and descriptions of the Chupacabra. I asked her if it was really logical to believe this animal had migrated across continents and stolen into farmhouses across the globe and to date not a single scientist had identified it as a species. Kind of like the Loc Ness Monster or Big Foot. (I should never mentioned this. Now Sophie is really freaked).


2. 2012: This one started at school. Some kid decided it would be great fun to scare the crap out everyone under ten years of age. This idiot boy announced to everyone within hearing distance that the world would come to an end in the year 2012. Even the first graders had discovered how close we are to 2012. Sophie was freaked. I explained that throughout the history of mankind, quite a few people had discovered their "gift of sight" and then predicted an end date that never took place. She assumed I was placating her. "Trust me, Soph." I said. "If the world was going to fall apart during 2012, why would I bother to send you to school? There'd be no point in educating you. Frankly, we'd stop going to the doctor for checkups, too. We'd just sit around and eat bon-bons all day waiting for the end."

3. Tornados: I have to keep reminding myself that Sophie is still a kid. She doesn't yet completely grasp the idea of "distance". A category 5 tornado in Oklahoma is just as scary as one developing in our backyard. She's convinced it will get us if we don't dig a storm cellar. No amount of pleading with her makes a difference. Unfortunately, we live in a dusty town. When a breeze blows through it invariably leaves a spinning funnel cloud in it's wake (I call 'em dust devils). Sophie tends to look slightly green whenever she sees one and I can see her brain working. She's afraid its going to morph into a giant tornado.

I suppose we could drop a double-wide mobile home in our backyard to molify her. That's what my Oklahoma-based father-in-law did. He called it his 'nader-bait. The theory was that the tornado would be magnetically drawn away from his home and would suck up the double-wide, sparing the brick and mortar abode with the fixed foundation.

In the meantime, the list goes on...