Right? I remember walking to school, and it was a 5 mile walk. When I got to middle school, I got a bike, but when that bike had a flat or was broken, I walked. We used to walk a quarter mile through our winding neighborhoods to get to a park and a 7-Eleven to buy Slurpees.
Kids today can’t play in their front yards anymore, let alone walk out of a neighborhood. This world is messed up.
How many remember seeing a large appliance being delivered and going to ask if might have the box? Going in mass to the local pool, swimming hole or creek in which case there were no adults? We played with firecrackers, cap guns, bottle rocks, tennis ball cannons, threw rocks at each other, rode our bikes down ridiculously steep hills, all without adults or helmets and pads.
I don't remember anyone ever getting really hurt.
you walked an hour and 15 minutes to school as a kid? I walked a mile to high school. But people don’t walk anymore except for exercise.
I walked to school on my own too in the 1970’s in PA. It was about 3/4 of a mile each way.
Walked lots of places, or rode my bike.
I was often miles from home on my own, as were all the other neighborhood kids.
Later on when I was riding a school bus, I stood outside and waited by myself for the bus. That’s not allowed anymore either.
Too many parents have been convinced by the media that they themselves are incapable of making decisions about their own children. And it seems like the sentence today’s parents utter most often to their children is “Be careful!”
One of the most idiotic things is the stupid helmets for bikes and such. The sight of a kid wearing a helmet and riding on a little bike with training wheels makes me want to smack his parents.
Five miles walk to school? Nonsense. A mile to a mile and a half maximum unless you were in High School and even then...five miles is a long damned way to walk on a good day for a kid.
I walk five miles every day and a good pace (~4mph) enough to make me sweat and it takes me an hour and 10 minutes minimum on a good day, longer if it snows or rains or is hot.
Our nephews aren’t allowed to play in their own yard. They came for a visit this summer but whined so much they were shipped off to the cousins early. They didn’t know how to ride a bike so we’d aired up the tires on all the bikes so they could learn but nooooo they didn’t want to go outside. We had all sorts of swim toys but noooo, that would also involve going outside. Couldn’t go caching, or to the park, or hiking, or fishing, or putt-putt or camping or anything that had to do with leaving the couch. They couldn’t go to the attached garage to play with the new kittens. Help me in the garden? No way. They refused to help hubby grill and he had to beg them to roast marshmallows on the porch. If parents and society are so hyper about letting kids their kids be kids, what is life going to be like when today’s kids are parents?
I hate getting stuck behind a school bus when kids are getting dropped off after school. The bus stops every 100 yards no matter how old the kids are. There’s no reason for bus stops to be so close together. Many kids would benefit from a daily walk to and from the bus stop.