Which one would you like to choose? A brand new car or the latest smartphone? 16-year-old Allison from California, says it's an easy (选择) — she'd take the phone.
Texting(发短信)is what drives her (社交的)life. She doesn't have a driver's license and hasn't rushed to get one. "I usually stay at home except when I have soccer (练习), and then Mom or Dad drives, "Allison said
Thirty years ago, (几乎)half of 16-year-olds had a driver's license, their passport to independence. It's a symbol of (进入)adulthood. But by 2010 that number had dropped to 28 percent.
This cultural (变化)is largely the result of technology, which helps teenagers (连接)to one another without even getting into a car. All the things teenagers like —music, movies, clothes, books —are (可获得的)with a mouse click(点击) . The Internet has offered (机会)for them to get a new kind of freedom.
This generation probably will buy fewer cars. They (应付)their lives as easily on the information highway as their parents once did on the real highway
Here's a little mystery I can't figure out —Why do we always say things we later wish we could take back, and why do we only say the things we wish to say when it's too late?
I often 1 things I wish I had told my mother before. I spent the last few days of her life at her bedside in the hospital telling her the things I'd wanted to tell her for years, that she was a good 2 and I was proud to be her daughter. 'd had a lifetime to tell her all those things, so3 did I wait?
My dad was also a man of 4 words, but he meant what he said. He always ended our calls with "Love you, Girl. "I had all sorts of questions I never asked him, but I never 5 his love.
Now, I have children and grandchildren of my own, and it seems like my husband and I are forever telling them how much they mean to 6 . They might get bored of it, but we'll never stop —we need to say it and they need to 7 it. Last week, for example, we phoned our youngest son to wish him a happy birthday. I listened as my husband told our son how 8 he is of the man and husband and father that he's become, and what a 9 it has been watching him grow up. He ended the call, as always, with "I love you, buddy. "And I yelled, "Me, too! "I hope he heard me.
10 we tell someone what they mean to us, we don't need to be poetic (诗意的)or even smart. We just need to mean it, and to make sure they hear it. And we need to do it now, while we can. The best time to say "I love you" is always right now.