ask dr. read      Idaho Statesman columns      new articles      biography      formal resume      philosophy      services offered      contact dr. read      psychology links      other links      forms      pictures		Communicate with Your Distant College Kids By Computer by James M. Read, Ph.D. My 18 year old son Tobias went to college in Pennsylvania last fall, and we've kept in touch almost daily ever since without a noticeable increase in our long distance phone bill. It's terrific! I don't talk to him that much, but we write little notes back and forth virtually every day. And no postage stamps necessary! I haven't yet been accused of being a "net head" but I do like sitting down at my computer and sending notes back and forth to Tobias in Pennsylvania, my brother in Maryland, and my brother-in-law and sister in California. It's a great communication tool. All it takes is a computer, a modem, a local phone call, and a network, like Compuserve. We're on Compuserve. It's cheap. $8.95 a month. Tobias is on Internet. It's free for him. Only the college is expensive. Every dorm room on campus is wired with Internet. No modem required. He has my old Macintosh SE at school (and complains frequently about how slow it is). When he went away I missed him immediately. But within a week he had his computer on line and we figured out how to send messages between Compuserve and Internet. It's easy. I thought we might slow down and write less often as time went by, and though that's happened a little, we haven't slacked off that much. I think that's largely because it's so easy to write a short note. A letter is harder. A phone call is more expensive and takes longer. And both people have to be in the right place at the right time. On the computer I can compose and send a short note anytime. He doesn't have to be there. We both are doing something on our computers several times a day so it's easy to retrieve any messages that might have come in. Last year I recommended fax machines to support long distance family communication. This year I'll add computer networks to the short list of indispensable tools for long-distance family communication. It really is wonderful! It's a great and cheap way to keep in touch. I sure wish PC's and Compuserve had been around in 1967. For two solid years I wrote a handwritten letter every single day to my girlfriend Heidi. I mailed it in Berlin (Germany) and she received it maybe a week or so later in Indiana. Of course, had we been using electronic mail then she might not now have 6 shoe boxes full of old love letters stored somewhere in this house. James M. Read, Ph.D. Clinical Psychologist  Originally published in The Idaho Stateman newspaper (Boise, Idaho) February 10, 1994 For more information, or to contact the author (that's me!), write to James M. Read, Ph.D., jread@jread.com