We all know that you can buy anything on the internet, and we all know that kids today are empowered with the internet. They have more knowledge about the world and about technology than most of us who are in our forties will ever hope to have, even if we have worked in computers for a long time.

Pay attention. These kids use computers like we, as parents, use knives and forks, or pen and paper! They are capable of finding out anything they want to know. There are places like Yahoo!Answers where you can post a question on just about anything and get 5-10 answers that are perfectly plausible, and in most cases, probably accurate. There are people who, like us, still believe that who they think they are talking to is who they say they are.

As I have said before, I am an average Mom. I stayed home for 5 years from a successful career to be sure that my son had a firm foundation. Two years ago, when he was in junior high, I went back to work, because we just could not afford for me to be home any longer. My son was alone in the afternoons for a couple of hours, but he’s always been a good kid, his homework was getting done, and it was all good. Tell me I’m wrong, that’s fine, but he is an only child, and he was a good kid. He’s always been somewhat of a loner and that didn’t change, but his behavior did not change either.

Last year, in his freshman year of high school, he had an English teacher who looked at him, (clean cut hair, clean clothes, 1 small earring in his left ear), and decided that he was trouble. She sought out reasons to pick on him, she complained about his behavior, and we, being the supportive parents, believed her. He flunked her class for 2nd semester. The first failing grade he has ever received. This meant he had to go to summer school for part of the summer, to make up the grade. He did. He got a C in summer school, not his best grade, but it was okay considering.

Between the end of school and the beginning of summer school, my son went to visit my Mom. My Mom lives a few hours away, on a ranch. My Mom used to sell real estate. My Mom, wanting to be on a level with my son, told him things she should not have. She told him about guns. She told him that when she had sold real estate, she always carried a gun. It was always somewhere on her person, she told him, and she never went much of anywhere without it.

This is where I’ll stop for today. But I’ll be back.