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I was thinking about e-mail, and how we give birth to it, nurture it, raise it, see it through its growing pains until we think it's mature enough, and then send it out into the ether to fend for itself.

Out there among the bits, the data packets, it often doesn't do well. Vicious routers tear at it, evil DNS servers misdirect it, cheap old coax cables mar its shiny youthful skin, and finally ruthless spam filters kidnap it and hold it for untold amounts of time.

And you sit there, as its parent, never knowing how it fared in the wilds of the internet; not knowing whether you'll hear about it when it reaches its destination; not knowing whether anyone will ever report having seen it, and if so, whether it was behaving admirably, whether it was gaining respect for itself, or if it had been flung into the trash bin like some ne'er-do-well spam.

We all think these things, yet we continue giving birth to new e-mails, composed of new thoughts. But, some of us at least wonder how the old ones did. They are, after all, reflections of our best inner thoughts, and, as such, are our best efforts at improving ourselves and our friends.