http://deadlevel.wordpress.com/2011/07/27/attention-teenagers-parent-consideration-please/
Sometime early last week, my 19-year old told me that she is attending a birthday bash of a classmate and as far as I can remember she mentioned of going home 12 midnight.
The party was last Friday and guess what? She came home 12 o’clock! I was even about to text her and ask how things are going, in case she might forget to go home to the time she promised or better yet to give her the chance to ask for an extension. But nope! Not my Nadine! She truly kept her word.
Often times, I would see teenagers on the streets at an indecent hour, disregarding danger, laughing loudly sometimes, enjoying the world as if it’s the last night. I would start to wonder, how are their parents taking it? For most, I bet they just don’t know much to worry about their children’s whereabouts. For the others? Maybe they just don’t bother checking anymore.
One of my hangouts after shift is the Coffee Station at Robinson’s Mall. There was one time when I and Muskeeterette Joanne decided to de-stress with mocha granita and pizza at the joint and we noticed a group of teenagers, probably college students, and they were all loud and acting up like typical brats or wannabe brats. Because of their uncontrollable voices, we can’t help but overhear the whole conversation.
There was this one who was bragging about how he told his mom that he needs an P10,000 apartment here in Bacolod. As he puffed his cigarette, I checked him out. He doesn’t really look like an haciendero’s son. He doesn’t even have a single branded item on his wardrobe, nothing spectacular in other words. And then all of a sudden he said, “we’re all going to flow right? I’ll text mom that I can’t go home coz we have to work on a project…” After a while, he read his mom’s reply, “do you still have pocket money and clothes left?”
My heart broke into pieces because I could just imagine how his mom is trusting him to be honest with her and diligent to his studies. I told Joanne that I feel sorry for the mother because for sure she is working hard in order to sustain his son’s needs.
Teenagers nowadays seem to brush aside the value of family, hard work, even value of money. Spending for cigarettes when one is not earning is simply a vanity that he or she is not deserving of. Demanding for a bigger allowance just to have enough for partying is such an inconsiderate thing especially to those whose parents are laborers, who do not bother to rest from the fields just so to finish their work and earn not only for themselves but of course to finance the long list of “school requirements” that their “loving” children send them. Having a spokesperson do the sales talk of how a laptop should be a necessity so that their mediocre-earning parents would squeeze every centavo in their pockets to produce an Acer at least, (China made notebooks are never an option, by the way).
Paging ingrate college students! Please bear in mind that you are sent to the best schools that you’re parents are trying to afford because they want you all to have an opportunity in life, something that maybe some of them did not have the luxury back then. Even if they have overflowing budgets for you, remember that they worked hard for it and it doesn’t give you the right to splurge on unnecessary things. You are sent to school to earn a degree and not concentrate on how to put on a masskara for an “emo” look.
I just hope that one day, you kids will realize how to value the right things, the right people. It’s not all about projection! It’s all about what you will become and how you will face the real challenges of living independently, sustaining your every need and survive the ferocity of life.
Just a thought from a concerned parent who hopes that this will be something worth pondering on.
Photo credit:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&biw=1138&bih=564&q=smoking+college+teens&gs_sm
No comments:
Post a Comment