As Our Parents Age So Do We

Like lots of other people this fall, I bought a new iPhone, the 4s model. My old 3G iPhone, which works just fine, went to my mother.

My mom likes to look things up, something that smartphones do easily. She has envied family members with iPhones and Androids, starting a year or two ago right after Thanksgiving dinner, when many of us had such fun grabbing our phones to discover answers to obscure facts that no one could remember. It was lots of fun, and my mom wanted to play, too. That was when she first dreamed of owning a smartphone.

Before signing her up for an access plan, the two of us decided to try an experiment.

Since Christmas Mom has used the iPhone as a wireless device around the house and at other places where the wireless can connect, such as Panera. It can’t make telephone calls, but otherwise it works just fine. She uses it to search the web, keep her calendar, check email, play solitaire, and enter names and addresses into contacts.

For the time being she uses her old mobile phone to make calls, but now my mom is ready to use the iPhone for real.

When my husband and I visited my parents last weekend, Mom decided that it’s time to stop carrying two gadgets around, and she’s ready to turn her iPhone into a real phone. So when I next visit, we’ll set up an iTunes account and then head over to AT&T to sign her up.

I’ll report our experiences as we go along.