One of Raine’s friends from school spent Mother’s Day. alone. at home. while her parents were out on a date to celebrate Mother’s Day. That’s like a bit of a surprise to Raine since we’ve always celebrated Mother’s Day and other occasions together as a family, no matter how busy we are.

When Raine told me this, she said she feels sorry for her friend whose parents seem to use money as a replacement for parental love. But what’s the point of her parents giving her money, money, money to buy anything she wants but they’re never there to do things with her?

Yes, it’s a sad fact these days, isn’t it? Even my 15-year-old thinks so. Came lunch time on Mother’s Day, her friend found herself home alone (her elder brother had gone out) with nothing to eat. So she called her parents. They bluntly told her to just go find something to eat and not to disturb their day out!

Her father is planning to take up a job overseas. She asks what’s wrong with the job he has right now and why can’t he stay? His reply, he’ll be making even more money if he goes. But she doesn’t want him to.

She’s trying to reach out to her parents. What she needs is love, Raine tells me, not money, but her parents just don’t get it! What good is money if they don’t care about her or how she’s doing in school or that she just wants to be a family?

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I met a mommy friend the other day and she was telling me her 12-year-old is such a budding little chef that she’s practically taken over her kitchen. Naturally I thought of my kids when I heard that, none of whom are culinary-ly-inclined (how do you like the new adverb I just coined?).

I felt perhaps the smallest stab of jealousy hearing what she said. Of course, part of me wanted to believe her claim fully but the more down-to-earth part of me kept reminding me that this woman has a tendency to exaggerate, just to make herself look better.

Much as I hate to compare my girls with hers, it still made me wish mine had the patience to stick around and roll out batches of sushi and bake a cake. Oh well, they’re good at craft and math and writing and so many other things so I really should stop comparing!

Raine’s friend has been calling up every week to invite her to some church event. It’s quite clear that this girl will not take no for an answer even though Raine has explained to her several times that we’re Buddhists.

She promises Raine that it will be fun and that she’ll really have a good time. Raine used to rush to the phone whenever it rings. These few weeks, she’s been shunning the phone and getting Skye to screen her calls.

I wish she would just stop calling, Raine said, is it because I don’t sound serious enough, Mom? I told her some people are just plain persistent, she’ll probably make a good salesperson .

So why don’t you just explain to her why you won’t go? Then she won’t call again, I said.

I already did that at school and on the phone the other day but she just won’t take no for an answer, was her reply.

In my mind, I’m thinking this ‘learning to say no’ is great practice for her. In this case, she’s decided she’s not interested in her friend’s proposition. Now she’s standing up for herself and even figuring out how to get out the situation gently.

When the phone rings, it’s likely not for me. These days, my teens hold monopoly over the house phone. I have my handphone, I suppose so most of my calls come through there.

I know most city kids get their own, personal, private handphone at around age 8 which is an awfully young age, if you ask me, but obviously not so to their parents.

My three kids share one handphone, which works out to be “whoever is going out or thinks they might need to call back”, gets to take the phone with them.

So far, it’s worked out great and I haven’t had any complaints so I’m just going to leave things as they are until we see a need for a second handphone to be shared among them three.

Some of the kids at school have been giving my kids a hard time about this arrangement. As you would’ve guessed, these are the ones whose parents have given them their own phone. So they’re teasing my kids about their “underprivileged” status.

My kids tell me these things in our daily chats. So do you think you need your own phone? I ask them. Yes, I want to hear their views on this, and if they’d told me they really need one, I’d have considered buying them one.

But it seems they agree with me that they don’t need a personal phone “to have and to hold” 24 hours a day. They like the present arrangement that we have. So I’m happy and they’re happy. Whew!