How to Make a Teenager Happy

I never saw the sense in ipods. I made my poor child suffer for years with a £14.99 mp3 from Tesco. Bad, bad mother! So this christmas, poppet is almost 15, works on Saturdays and buys whatever treats she wants and I’m thinking what do I get for the girl who has money to buy her own stuff?That’s when I found myself speaking those words every teenager loves to hear…..’How would you like an ipod this christmas’?She wailed and cried ‘Mother, don’t you realise your buying into the two biggest commercialised brainwashing machines of our time that is Christmas and Apple, in order to try and buy my love with a little piece of overpriced technology?’. Actually she didn’t, she mumbled something from behind her magazine which I think was ‘yeh cool’.  

I logged on to Tesco.com to order a Nano version. I did this because it was easier and I got 500 club card points (not to be sniffed at, that’s £5 back you know). That’s when I saw the choice of colours, oh my goodness, the colours! My little heart skipped a beat, more than likely at the thought of parting with over one hundred quid for one flipping present, but also because of the colours. I went for purple as I knew poppet would like that but I really wanted orange or pink for my own satisfaction.

I had no idea they came so nicely packaged, a bit like the cases Swatch watches used to come in only smaller and more stylish. I was in awe of this beautifully boxed little radio, tiny TV thingy.  

The big day arrived and the unwrapping of the presents began. Poppet had that thing unwrapped and the white earphones plugging her little ears before I could say ’Why do none of the buttons on an Applemac do what I think they should?’. After she had ignored me and her gran for a good hour or so while she hummed like an old fridge to some poptastic tune, I coyly asked for a little look at the little purple bundle of joy. I watched in wonder as we hooked it back up to i tunes so I could see ‘our’ nano on screen, purple, synchronising. I was hooked. Well and truly hooked. And when I saw the cd covers stacking up on the shiny white floor when the ipod tipped sideways I knew one thing. I had to get me an orange one!

I love it that I’m living in the modern age. I look back in pain on Sundays in Inverness years ago when no shops were open and I had to sit through Last of the Summer Wine and Highway with Harry Secombe. I hated it and wanted to die on a Sunday and celebrated the day I was old enough (well, looked old enough) to get into pubs. There were no ipods. I had a Phillips ‘personal stereo’ that I had to carry about in a reinforced harness on my back (I might be exaggerating), which ran out of batteries frequently. Then there was the taping of the Top 40 on a Sunday which required the careful stopping and starting of the record button to avoid the DJs speaking bits. Life was hard. Its an existence I don’t want to go back to. Yes we live in an commercialised age but so what, I say. I love it. I love cinemaplexes, Sky TV, Games consoles, the Internet. It keeps me feeling youthful. So I’m getting an ipod. Have you got one? They’re cool. Get an orange one.