[southernau]

I really like this discussion. Three generations of collegiate greek women in my family recently discussed the changes over time (50 years) of living in college. (I actually found out my mom did some pretty funny things in college that I would have never dreamed of!). Anyway, we all agreed we had similar feelings of insecurities, excitement, roommate situations and dreams while we were away at school. What my mother and I did not have was the instant technology to text, Skype, or whatever, if a problem came up. We had to handle it on our own, and seek out friends, etc. My mother had a house phone that had a time limit of 3 minutes a week to talk in a very public parlor. I had a hard-line phone in my room, but was only allowed to call on Sundays, or if there was an emergency, due to the long distance cost. Now, college kids have access to a parent (or vise versa) at a fingertip.
There are good and bad to both ways of growing up, but what I think what my daughter has had to learn, that was” built in” for my mother and I was giving things time. Time to think about problems on your own; time to work things out with people; time to get over being upset; time for friendships to build…etc. This current fluidity of information and contact is amazing, but can be quite overwhelming as well.