Well I never!

I never dreamed that after raising 3 children of my own would I ever have to utter these 4 simple words again. "GET OFF THE PHONE!" However the next generation has arrived and sadly to say, I found myself having a flash back to the past when I had to once again repeat it. This time it was not my kids, but those of others. The story goes....

After a rainy afternoon that turned to freezing rain, unfortunately there was a 2 car accident (once again) in front of our house and blocking 1/2 of the street. No one appeared hurt, it looked like a fender bender type and the 2 drivers were walking briskly back and forth. After repeatedly asking if the 2 young lady teenagers were ok, they put their phone(s) down and said, "Oh yeah." When asked if they could turn their flashers on, they again had the phones glued to their ears and didn't move - traffic was still coming and in the dark they could not see the cars well. It was very evident they were talking to friends and discussing their "crash" as they called it and in their conversations they berated the other traffic who were trapped on the icy hill and could not drive back up it. Some cars slid down the hill slowly which was totally out of their control and the girls again started yelling at them. I asked if they called the police and again while talking on the phone I was ignored. The rain poured, we were all soaked and I succumbed to that old parental phrase.."Get Off the Phone!" I called the police myself, told the girls they needed to call their parents and after 5 minutes more, the "2nd team" arrived to take care of it. The parents never said thank you, the girls just walked away and left it to someone else to clean up the mess.

I'm not sure about anyone else but something is wrong with this picture. Where is the sense of responsibility to take care of things and the common sense to get it done. It amazed me from the action of the parental unit that the apple apparently doesn't fall far from the tree.
Sad but true.