The three things conversation

Every day at 3:14, I call N-son for the Three Things conversation. 

(Okay, actually, it's almost every day. Sometimes one of us is otherwise occupied.  Still—unless I shut it off because I'm in a theater or a meeting or something—every day at 3:14 my alarm pings, and I try to stop what I'm doing, and call N-son.)

The topic of this short phone call is to trade our stories about these three things:

1. Something that made you happy.
2. A good deed you did.
3. Something you're looking forward to. 

That's all we need to talk about.

The calls usually last 5–10 minutes; if it gets close to 10 minutes, one of us makes "Mama hates phone calls" noises (which is true), and we wrap it up.  Sometimes saying good-bye after a short conversation would feel rude or dismissive, but we both know that we'll get to talk again tomorrow, so it's okay to cut it short today.

I started doing this a bit more than a year ago, when N-son was feeling particularly lonely and left out, and I wanted a way to connect with him.  The fact that we've been doing this for more than a year tells you how much we really have come to relish this daily ritual.

There have been a lot of ups and downs during the year; some of these conversations have veered off into describing the downs.  I have reminded N-son that neither one of us has to pretend to be happy . . . but that even when things are going terrible, there are small good things, too.  You can acknowledge the hard times, while still using the glimmers of good as the rungs of a ladder to help you start climbing up out of the pit. And this seems to work.  There have been times I've listened to N-son rail angrily or dejectedly through a 15-minute rant about his situation, and then he paused, and said: " . . . . but there have been good things, too.  Here are my three things . . .".

I also like adding #2 (a good deed we did) into the usual mix of gratitude: I try to get us out of our own heads into thinking about other people and our world.

As someone who hates talking on the phone but who loves my kids, I have to say that I've come to treasure this ritual.  The fact that it's scripted makes it a lot easier than the "just saying hi/how are you?" conversation that I find so awkward; it's a good way to catch up quickly.  And during the rest of the day, we both look forward to the time we'll get to chat. Sometimes we go out of our way to, say, pick up a piece of trash from the street so we can count that as our good deed. Sometimes I get to tell another person, "I told my son that you were the thing that made me happy today," spreading the happiness even further.  In fact, my friends all know what the 3:14 alarm means, and sometimes they'll join in on the conversation if they're with me when it rings. 

And that's it: the Three Things Call.  And now I'm getting past my 10 minutes of writing, so I'm going to hang up this post.  Talk to you later.