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I have only myself to blame.

I honestly thought it was a good idea to introduce my mother to stuff like Facebook and text messaging. She's a smart woman and besides, that way I could always find her when I needed her.

So several years ago we forced her to get a cell phone and then two years ago we gave her a laptop for Christmas. In all fairness to me, that was my sister-in-law's idea.

The first time my mother's cell phone actually rang she was with my nephews. "What's that noise?" she asked. "Granny, it's your cell phone," my nephew informed her. "What do I do now?" she inquired. "Answer it," my nephew instructed. "How?" came her reply. It was then we suspected this might have been a mistake.

Eventually, she learned to text. Sort of. Now I get cryptic messages like "Where u?" and "Cll me." One time she asked me several questions in a row (again, sort of) and I finally answered her, to which she replied, "No text and drive."

She also hasn't quite figured out yet the difference between Facebook messaging and Facebook posting. Now everyone knows what's for lunch on Sunday and that the bread she made for me is ready for pick up.

My mother can sew, change oil, and given the right staff, achieve world peace. But copy and paste is beyond her. I tried to walk her through it once on the phone. I told her to click on the document. "What document?" she asked. "The one you want to copy," I instructed. "And then hit control A."

Do you know what she said? "Why?" I restrained myself from saying "Because I told you so!" Eventually we agreed that copy and paste wasn't really that important and I would do it myself when I came over to get the bread.

And then, just the other day, she lost her email icon, address book, saved messages - the whole shebang. Gone. She explained that the "whole thing" locked up on her and she started "poking buttons." Did she remember the exact last button she poked? Well yes, she guessed it was "unpin."

Remember the days when they used to tell you to go ahead and poke buttons, that you couldn't possibly do any harm? Turns out those days are over. I left mom with the promise that I would get my sister-in-law, who is much smarter than I (or so I thought until she suggested we buy mom a laptop), to fix it for her. Twenty minutes later I got a text that read "Email me k." I assume mom had stubbornly resumed poking buttons and wanted to know if she was making progress. This is, you understand, the same woman who had a colonoscopy at 8 a.m. and by 2 p.m. that same day had canned two dozen jars of apple butter. I know she is capable.

But none of our electronic challenges can compare to the time she opened an email that she admitted she thought was suspicious and in turn got a virus. That little incident earned me a phone call to Dell in Indonesia during which I said the F word in front of my mother for the first time and the customer service agent asked repeatedly "You plug in?"

Yes, I plug in. But I think it's time to unplug mom.

- Holly Kelsey-Henry

Holly Kelsey-Henry is the owner of DownWrite Creative in Wisconsin and makes her living as a writer - some days more profitably than others. She is a former award-winning journalist and still writes for newspapers and magazines.