thinking forwards...

So I got a FWD: from my mom today.  This makes somewhere in the neighborhood of 8 this week.  It's Wednesday.  I'm not mad.  In fact, it's kind of cute that my mom thinks of me often enough to send me around 12 emails she didn’t write and may not have even read per week.  It’s not the forwards themselves that bother me- it’s their contents.  The forwards she sends me make me question whether or not I really sprung from her loins or if, perhaps, I was one of those kids in the 80’s taken from a shopping mall. 

The first kinds of forwards my mom sends her agnostic daughter (me) are religious.  “FWD: An Angel Wing Prayer for You- FUNNY!” and “FWD: Check Your Beatitudes- MUST READ” are just some of the thinly veiled Catholic threats I can expect on a weekly basis.  The second sorts of forwards I receive are chain letters.  I can expect at least one “FWD: You’re in my top 11 so pass this on or else…” every week. WTF?  Top 11?  I only have 2 sisters so who are the other 8?  And is that a threat?  I love my mom dearly, but I had to call her about the chain letters:

Me: Mom, what’s the deal with the chain letters?

Her: What do you mean?

Me: I mean the emails you send me that threaten that we won’t be friends anymore if I don’t send it to 14 people in14 minutes.

Her: Oh.  Well, what’s wrong with them?

Me: Nothing. They’re just a waste of pixels and time.  Why don’t you send me a real email with information in it and we talk and catch up and stuff? (though I could barely believe it myself, the next statement is 100% verbatim)

Her: Well, I know they’re probably not real but I just get scared because WHAT IF THEY ARE*?

*this, in case you’re wondering, is why George W. won the election twice- little fear, dash of stupidity.  Love you, mom but you diiiiid vote for him…

Lastly, my mother sends my many forwards about “How to NOT get raped or killed or kidnapped or have your ankles slit by a fake cop while loading Christmas gifts into your car at a mall parking lot.” (Then answer, by the way, is either to dial *7923743252435 if you think you see a fake cop OR to shop online)  These emails distress me almost as much as if my ankles were being slit and so I’m not really sure what purpose they serve.  My dad, for his part, joined the fray and purchased me a roadside tire pump and a rape whistle last Christmas.  I called it a “Stalking” stuffer.   My mom thought that was tacky of me.

Technology, it would seem, is a cruel mistress; a Pandora’s box of information, info-tainment and misguided FWD’s from the people you love most.  I love my mom dearly and we actually do talk on the phone and over email quite often.  But no matter how many times I tell her not to send me religious chain letters about kidnapping, she just can't help herself.  She's hooked and it's too late.  Kids, it’s never too early to talk to your parents about sending forwards…