"At the same time, they're confronted by popular culture in a way their parents never were. It's a much smaller world for kids today and it can feel cramped. Also, today's kids don't spend as much time with their parents as in previous generations. Sometimes none at all."
This has long been a fact of life for Lisa, whose father operates a business based in China. He spends several weeks at a time there keeping shop and, according to Lisa, keeping the company of another woman.
"I know he has a girlfriend over there because I can look at my mom and see it. Of course no one has ever spoken about it," Lisa said. "I thought it was my fault. My mom has only gone with him to Shanghai once or twice because she had to stay here with me. I'm sure it was one of the things that led me to do what I did." Now in college studying art, toting a backpack with a zoo of small stuffed animals hanging from it, Lisa seems light years from the depression she suffered just two years ago. Still, she admits, her emotions can get the better of her, particularly when she returns home from university.
"My parents always encouraged me in what I wanted to do, as long as it was business or law. I did poorly on the Joint College Entrance Exam and now I'm studying art. They're not happy about it, but I am." If her sentiment sounds selfish, it is, and that's the point. "The person I tried to kill that day was my parent's daughter. I want to live."
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