Turning the Friend Switch On.

Today, my son turned the switch to "on" and he found a friend waiting.

***

Let me back up a few steps.

It had been more than a year since we put batteries in his walkie talkie.

But this morning, a lazy morning (at best)....his father decided to load

his walkie talkie with fresh batteries so that he could banter from his

upstairs closet to his "in-the-kitchen-little-sister" until he either had

nothing more to say or lost interest entirely.

Either way, this was a solid 20 minutes of play between the two of them

and we did what we could to encourage it.

But, seconds after the batteries were placed into the tiny machine, Dec

heard a familiar voice on the other end of the line.

And it wasn't his baby sister.

I listened with interest or rather a "What the....?" in my gut.....

It was his classmate (wha?), playing walkie-talkie with HIS baby sister just

across the lake.

When I first heard this familiar, yet strange neighborly voice come through the walkie talkie

I thought to myself, "what is the mileage range on those gadgets????".

And after completing a quick calculation, I realized that it was indeed, possible (though quite

a surprise) that

our son Declan had just intercepted conversations between his classmate

and his younger sister.

Just under two miles. And so, we were.

There is so much that I loved about this amazing discovery between friends - classmates:

"Declan, where are you standing right now?" questions. And the "What did

your baby sister dress up as for halloween?" questions.

So adorable.

So earnest.

So sincere.

So - clinging to every last syllable of every last response....

In fact, I really loved the awkwardness at the end of their conversation.

The "how do I end this.... " as they kept saying "goodbye and over-and-out

to each other.

But most of all I loved that this radio wave exchange was

mind boggling

powerful

had little to do with me arranging it

keeps my son wishing to talk on his simple walkie talkie even more

and reminded me *SO MUCH* of the MANY

simple discoveries that I made when I was young....

and I loved that it taught me that

It is amazing what you can hear

and, of what you will find

when you

decide it is time

to turn the friend switch on.