While I was incredibly excited to have the chance to chat with my son via MSN messenger all the way across the "grossen Teich", it has proven to be more of a hindrance. We chatted daily for about a week until I received an email from him requesting to take a "time out". It appears he felt strange about the whole thing. Needless to mention, I was distraught for a moment. Here I was, 21 years in agony over a child I could not see with a new chance of reconnecting and I felt that I had blown it.

I sent him a brief but understanding email....and will wait for him to come back 'round. It occurred to me that the anonymity of Internet chat is not always a good thing. In this case, the exchanges were brief, somewhat disconnected and didn't lend themselves to forging a relationship between a lost child and mother. I should've thought of that before I happily agreed to exchange MSN handles. What we really needed was a "real-time" visit, good old fashioned snail mail letters and photo exchanges and the like. A much slower approach to forging a relationship. The instant exchanges of photos, meaningless banter and the like didn't help or apparently mean a whole lot in the scope of things.

I do understand his feelings.... and respect them. I think I will go and buy some funky stationary and write an old-fashioned letter with postage and everything.