Aloneness

With one in four young people now indicating that they have never had a meaningful conversation with their father, is it any wonder that 76 percent of the 1,200 teens surveyed in USA Today actually want their parents to spend more time with them?

Andree Alieon Brooks, a New York Times journalist, in her eye-opening book Children of Fast-Track Parents, describes her interviews with scores of children and parents who seemed to "have it all": "If there was one theme that constantly emerged from my conversations with the children it was a surprising undercurrent of aloneness&md;feelings of isolation from peers as well as parents despite their busy lives."