When my daughter was born, I created a Gmail account with her name. She doesn’t know this email even exists yet. I don’t plan on handing it over to her until she is 12 years old.
I created the account for several reasons.
1. To preserve the email name for her.
It is disappointing when you try to start an email account and find that the one you wanted is already taken. By capturing it now, she will avoid having to add a number or some other distinction to her name.
2. To keep her from choosing the kind of email that many 12 year old kids choose.
As a teacher, I have returned many emails from students with addresses like unicornandrainbows2, mindcraftwarrior7 and jellybeanzrock. To a 12 year, these may seem fun. However, when it is time to apply for scholarships and colleges, they are going to want something a little less juvenile.
3. To give her a treasure trove of memories and photos.
This is the main reason I created the account.
When she was first born, I asked all her relatives to email her describing their life and the first time they met her. Since then, I have reminded them periodically to email the account with updates.
At least once a year, I have emailed the account myself telling her about what is going on in the world and about what has happened in our life. I include lots of photos. I do this for holidays, birthdays, family trips and important events in our life.
Just today, I emailed her about the fun we had watching the Chiefs win the Super Bowl last night. My daughter was so excited about the game. We ate snack foods, played Commercial Bingo, and wore our team jerseys.
I included a selfie that we took together in our team gear. The pic would have probably sat in my phone to be lost next time I change phones or need extra memory.
Watching the game together may or may not be a memory that sticks with her for a life time, but now it is a memory and a picture that she will absolutely see and read about later in her life.
When she gets older, probably around 12, I plan on turning the account over to her.
I log on periodically to make sure Google doesn’t deactivate the account or to clean up any spam or miscellaneous emails. Although I do read the emails from the relatives, I keep them marked as unread waiting to be discovered by her in the future.
Looking through the account, there have already been a couple of relatives that have passed away and that she will have little or no memory of. But, their words are preserved and waiting for her to read them.
Looking back, it is already like a time capsule for me of many of the happiest times of my life. I can’t wait for her to experience it first hand.
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This post was previously published on medium.com.
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Photo credit: Brett Jordan on Unsplash
