Email addresses are for life?

So yesterday I was having coffee with a group of friends. We were having a nice chat, when one of my friends asked if any of us knew how to forward emails to a new address. We all sat in stunned silence. Nope, this is one of those things you need a teenager for. She went on to explain she was considering getting a new email address because her husband hated hers since it had her former last name in it. Uhm, I don’t think the problem here is the email. Why are she and her husband not having face to face conversations? Or at least phone calls? Or, heaven forbid, the dreaded texts? Anything more personal than an email. However, there was no way I was going to point this out. Anyway, our conversation morphed into how we ended up with our email addresses. Several also had an address which contained a last name which was either a maiden name or from a previous marriage. One’s address was an unfortunate nickname from college which had seemed funny at the time but now, some 30 years later, is anything but. She said she also had considered changing her email over the years but it seemed just to difficult. We then spent a few minutes discussing how there must be a way since it’s so easy to forward physical mail. Maybe you could even just forward the mail you want and eliminate all the spam and junk. Wow, wouldn’t that be nice. It was about then, I realized one friend hadn’t shared about her email. I turned to her and asked. She sat still as a stone for a moment and then made us all pledge that what she shared wouldn’t leave the room. (Sorry – but I’m changing names and I did ask her permission). “Mine is the place and date Steve asked me to marry him.” Her husband’s name is Bill and apparently he doesn’t know about Steve who was out of the picture long before Bill ever came in. All of this left me wondering – how permanent is permanent? We pick a name for our child but they can change it as soon as they turn 18. We pick an email address and we’re stuck with it for life? Nope, everything can change. Something are just harder to. Somethings are mistakes which we must fight to make right. Don’t live with something because you think there is no other options. Dig, scratch, search – do whatever you need to do. But don’t live with less than you deserve.