Stalker Daughter

There was a time albeit distant that people would leave a message after the beep if the person they were calling didn't answer the phone. A time before cell phones, and email, and IM and bluetooth and caller ID. I like all of this technology. I live 1200 miles from my family, and I have friends all over the country. I like the "free" long distance that my cell phone provides and DUDE the friends and family plan rocks! It means that I don't even have to touch my cell minutes to call my mom, dad, or brother (or anyone else on Cingular-wait, I mean AT &T.) What has all this connectedness done though? It's made it so I kind of freak out if I can't get ahold of people that's what it has done. Before I'd leave a message and wait patiently until I got a call back. Today I felt slightly stalkerish when I called my mom at 8:15 her time this morning. Then I thought, well maybe she's at church already. Then at noon her time and thought, well maybe she wasn't at church earlier and is now. Then I called her again at 4 her time and when she still didn't answer I started wondering exactly what I'd done to upset her because we never go this long without talking and it's Mark's birthday and it's very odd for her not to call on his birthday and oh my goodness WHERE is she? Then I remembered it's Mark's birthday which means it's also my parents anniversary, so maybe, just maybe they are out doing something fabulously fun that a couple does when they've been married 34(?) years (I hope I got that right guys, I'm sketchy on the math here.) So, I left her a message saying, I hope things are ok and you guys are having a great anniversary, and call me later! Cool and calm I was! Then I called my dad's cell phone and got voicemail again, so I called my brother to find out if they were gone somewhere and I just didn't get the memo, and got his voicemail. Well, Jason works nights so maybe he was still sleeping, or getting ready for work, or at the gym or something. The fact remained that in this age of connectivity I could not reach one person in my family. It disturbed me. A lot. So I tried reasoning with myself that 1. I had not done anything to make everyone so mad at me that NO one would answer my calls. 2. The odds of them having vanished off the face of the planet were pretty slim. 3. Even if someone had broken into mom and dad's house, tied them up, or done them bodily harm, that wouldn't explain why Jason wasn't answering. So then, unable to be rational my mind went to, oh no what if they were in an accident, would I know by now? What if someone HAD hurt them. Alien abduction? Ok, the last one is a joke, but I really was quite concerned about the potential for the other two. Because, you see, I talk to someone in my family every day. Sometimes multiple times, and to go so long with no word was unusual. I finally calmed down and decided to stop stalking and go do something else and before I knew it my phone rang and it was my mom (whew, not dead!) and she asked if I had called three times (yes, ma'am that was me!) and told me they were in their scuba diving class. Which I knew about, and they had a great time thanks! I feel silly for overreacting but seriously, next time a reminder would be appreciated!

I love you mom and dad! Happy anniversary! And, I'm just kidding about the reminder... kinda.