Kids With Phones

Newsletter 2023-06-08

I was twenty-one when I got my first cell phone. This week, I bought one for a fourth grader. That would have been bad enough, but I had to get one for my eleven-year-old, too. Both of those phones are better than my thirteen-year-old’s current one, which has a cracked screen and the processing power of a potato, so I ended up replacing hers as well. The upfront costs were just the beginning. I’ll now be paying for two extra phone lines every month, probably until all of the girls are married with families of their own, if not longer. Kids these days stay on their parents’ health insurance until they’re twenty-six and on the family cell phone plan until their mom and dad die or go broke, whichever comes first. After the latest price hike, it will be a photo finish. As recently as a few years ago, I thought a little kid with their own cell phone was living a life of luxury and privilege. Now, I consider it on par with providing electricity and indoor plumbing. Not that my children have mastered either one. For the millionth time, please flush.