My daughter’s friends attend a photography camp over winter break. She practically seethes with jealousy. Why do they get to do this and she can’t?

“Life’s not fair!”

I try to appeal to her common sense – reminding her that four half days playing with cameras is no substitution for carrying around a camera – like the one in her iPhone – and taking a lot of pictures, frequently.  She doesn’t want an iPhone camera though. It’s not good enough.  She “needs” a DSLR,  like mine – the kind with the big lenses.  The kind that take the professional-looking photos with the sharp details and creamy soft background.

“You can borrow if you promise to be careful with it.”  She does promise and for the next 30 minutes she furiously takes pictures of anything that catches her eye.  And when she’s done, I load the photos on my laptop and we review. Some of them are pretty good.

Her enthusiasm wanes almost immediately.  It was never about photos or cameras.  It was about relationships and suddenly feeling downgraded and left out.

Want to talk about it?  “No,” she moans. “You wouldn’t understand.”