5 Reasons

Patrick has been harping on me to get him a cell phone for awhile now. Apparently some of his friends have them. The boy is ten. He's always with either me, his dad, one of his big brothers or a family friend. Rarely do we drop him off anywhere on his own, not even soccer or baseball practice.
The child has no good reason to own a cell phone. At least not yet. His older brothers got theirs when they hit middle school or turned 12, just about the time when I needed to know where they were and who they are with. After all that is the job of a good parent.

Now on the few rare occasions that I've spoken to Patrick on our home phone our conversations go something like this...

Me: Hi Patrick
P: Hi Mom
Me: Whatcha doing?
P: Nothing.
Me: Where are your brothers?
P: I don't know.
Me: Where's Dad?
P: Here.
Me: Can I talk to him?
P: Okay.

Riveting stuff. The child does not talk to his friends on the phone, he barely talks to his Nana on the phone, there is no good reason for him to own one, at least now.
So our cell phone conversation continued yesterday afternoon, and exasperated I told him, "If you can give me five good reasons why I should get you a cell phone, I will. (With absolutely no intention of following through since I would be the one determining what is or is not a good reason.)

Patrick's Reasons

If I was walking home with Kevin and his mom and I sprained my ankle and his mom's cell phone was dead and his mom couldn't carry me home. 

I got dropped off at soccer practice. I got injured and mom and dad weren't there and the coach's batteries were dead.

I'm at baseball practice. I get hit with a baseball hard in the ankle and had a hard time walking and the coach's batteries were dead and coach A.'s phone got broken when it was hit with a foul ball and he couldn't use it.


If I was playing basketball at the park with Kevin, I sprained my ankle after taking a shot. We were the only ones there.


 I was at the park with Kevin and he started throwing up from a bad sandwich he had eaten earlier and his parents weren't there I could use my cell phone to call them.
Hard to argue with the bad sandwich logic.

But the kid still has to wait until he's 12.