The Perils of Skype

We have been trying to use Skype with Toby and his long distance grandparents for a few months now. I can't say it works all that well with our rural "high speed internet" but both devoted sets of grandparents have humoured us and are grateful for any opportunity to see and chat with Toby...even if it involves a grainy, slow motion picture with a 20 second delay.

So what a shock for the poor boy when we skyped with him for the first time on high speed. Rob and I were enjoying a long weekend in Las Vegas while Toby was busy being spoiled by his Toronto grandparents and family when I woke up the second morning of our trip and was so excited to talk to Toby that I didn't even anticipate the trauma that it might cause him.

As soon as our faces came up on the computer screen Toby gasped in shock and exclaimed, “what HAPPENED, Mommy!?!?”

I guess it WOULD be rather scary to have your mother disappear for 24 hours and then find her as a 2 dimensional image on your grandmother’s laptop.

I had to calm him down and explain to him that we’d been on an airplane and gone to a place called Vegas and that we missed him very much and would be home soon.

“Where’s DADDY?” was his curt response,

Good God, he was a 2 dimensional creature as well.

Just as I thought Toby was going to go and launch himself off the nearest bridge, his face disappeared and all I could see was the top of his head. Up close.

He was hugging the screen.

It was when he tried to follow his hug up with wet kisses that we got disconnected.

Technology is marvelous. Although we were 3 time zones and hundreds of miles away, we still got to traumatize and then hug and kiss our little boy.