Monday, January 09, 2006

Kids These Days

When I was straightening up the house tonight, while I tended to the whims of 4 year-old Eliana and the cries of 6 month-old Dominic, and while Vickey was working (a Pampered Chef show in the northwest part of the valley … may as well be in a different town … oh wait, it is), I started thinking about kids these days.

These days kids grow up using a computer. They know how to pause digital TV and resume playing when they’re ready to finish watching their program. Mobile telephones are toys. Commercials portray every kid’s right to posses the latest and greatest.

And it feels like a constant uphill battle to install character traits like work, responsibility and respect.

Perhaps parents of all ages have felt similarly. But I’ll bet my 4 year-old has more possessions at this point in her life than I did by the time I was 18. With her own bedroom, a playroom, and part of the family study dedicated to housing her wares, I just have to wonder if she’d really miss much of it if it were suddenly gone.

Perhaps the bursting at the seams feeling comes from the accumulation of stuff for the past five years and recent completion of Christmas. Or perhaps we’ve just grown too accustomed to instant gratification and keeping up with the Jones’.

I just wonder what kids these days will be like when I’m in my retirement days.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

It really is funny isn't it, all the toys. I'm reading and adding this comment as I watch TV on my couch and connect through wireless on a mobile laptop computer.
But honestly ALL kids are spoiled in the perspective of their parents.