Where are the children?

[85 Day Jerk]

I was just sitting here reading the posts and thinking if I have anything to say and it sorta creeped up on me that the summer is almost half over and yet, I have not seen kids running around doing the traditional summer stuff.  To go around my neighborhood in the day, you would think that the kids are all in school or something.  It is really creepy.  I have no kids of my own, but if I did, I would give them two choices; 1. After breakfast, they could leave the house on their bicycles and go out and have fun all day, or 2. Mope around the house and running up the electric bill with Playstation, X-Box, chatting on the computer for 3 hours hen-pecking 5 minutes worth of dialog to some dumbass kid that lives just 85 yards up the street, until I lose my mind and send him out of the house on a stretcher.  I see this shit every day and it makes me sick.  I have seen just one, only one stinkin Lemonade Stand the whole damn summer.  What the hell is up with kids these days?  O.K., I can give credit to some kids up on 19th Avenue.  They come from wealthy families and were the first on their block to own Jackass the movie on DVD.  These charming idiots take their father's expensive riding mowers and soup up the engines and race them all around the block.  It is pretty funny to see them do it, but outside of that, there is really not much going on.  Sure, it is pretty damn hot outside, but that is no excuse.  I think all this "computer age" stuff has turned our nation's children into a bunch of overweight junkfood gobbling candy-ass retards that have to have their entertainment spelled out and packaged to them, and cannot survive more than 15 seconds outside of a esotheric Climate Controlled environment.  Lord God, Mother Mary and Sonny Boy Jesus, if I were to ever see a child catch and skin a fish to take home and actually eat, I would probably fill my pants right on the spot!!  A lot of this is coming from a buzz that is in the very air down here in Sunny St. Pete Florida.  The apathy and complacency all around, the children cooped up in all those empty boxes they call home, the growing pot culture and the anti-drug coalition that goes with it is all adding up to the resurgence of another generation of "Drug Treatment Facilities."
I can see the signs stirring like bits of paper caught in a swirling dust devil on a hot summer day.  A hot summer day where I should be seeing children playing outside and enjoying their freedom, but I dont.  This scares the hell out of me.  How about the rest of you fine people?

[Anonymous]

I'd check out the bowling alleys. It seems that kids these days are allergic to sun and don't want to seem "redneck". So, they're staying indoors getting pale and clammy skin. Some of them seem to be turning green. Kids these days. The white kids I know act like black kids. They talk like them, act like them, but they are white kids from upper middle class neighborhoods. It's weird, man. This new development is strange. I had a manager who was a big black man and we had these young white youths (one was the owner's son) at work, imitating rappers and using "ghetto" slang and the whole nine. I was this close to asking the manager what he thought of this wackiness, but decided to chill high on the sly in regard to racial references. But I'm sure he would have gone off on it and we would have had a good laugh. It was like Theo Huxtible in reverse. I think these were young white crackhead honkey cracker wannabe Kobe Bryants, not that there's anything wrong with that. But they don't fish or skateboard much. They get high and go bowling. I don't understand.

[hedwigfan]

Maybe this'll comfort you a little. My twin boys, about to turn 13, are avid hunters and fishermen. My husband has taught them everything he knows a bout nature, and it amazes me that they can identify birds flying overhead. They help me bait my hooks because I don't like worms. They are primitive campers, can pitch their own tents, and build a campfire. They are learning archery. They also love skateboarding and Marvel comics. They're both very artistic and make up their own cartoons. They are fun as hell to be around. They love Rage Against the Machine, Black Sabbath, and Jimi Hendrix. They've got some really nice friends. They're easy going and mellow. I don't know what the next few years will be like, but somehow, I don't think they'll be too bad. I think they're awesome.

[Antigen]

Mine just got back from some activity at the library. It's so nice to live in a place where it's reasonably safe for the 13yo to walk the 6yo a half mile to the library or out to pick berries or whatever.

But I'm disapointed that the paranoia seems to have preceded us. Around here, they don't allow trick-or-treating on Haloween eve. Instead, they schedule it for the last Saturday afternoon of the month.

Funny story. My daughter's friend's family invites us out to hang where the locals do to see the Charleroi fireworks show. So here's what the locals do to avoid the crowds. They park on the 20' - 50' shoulder of a posted 40MPH highway and tail-gate accross the river from the town with the cool pyrotechnics. Without a care, these folks enjoy the flashy and sometimes blinding fire-works bursting overhead, people milling about, jockeying for parking, cars whipping by, sometimes filled with loud revelers, at anywhere from rubber neck to break-neck speeds.

It was in this context that I and the other mother got to talking about the quirky local custom of shifing holidays, and how and why they do this with Haloween. I thought it was out of misplaced fear of something happening to the kids, what with all the crime reporting (actual rates haven't changed significantly since the 50's).

So there I was, after convincing our friends to move the lawn chairs between the vans so as to provide a crash barrier in case someone lost the road, that I tried to plea the case that kids should be allowed to have fun, that they shouldn't be stiffled by over-protectiveness, that the neighborhood streets are just not as dangerous as the news anchor tells us, that there IS no significant crime problem here. She said, "yea, and we don't want one!"

They're not afraid for the kids, they're afraid of the kids!

Then, just the other night, for the first time in the year that I've lived here, I heard and caught a glimpse of a group of about 6 kids laughing, playing and just having a good time out in public on a warm summer night.

...to disarm the people (is) the best and most effective way to enslave them...
-- George Mason

[xeon]

My six year old daughter is outside as much as she can be.  She does get bored when none of her friends are around, but she stays pretty active.  Sorry but fishing isn't her bag, she'd rather play "pretend" or ride her bike.  She does crash in the house for a DVD here and there of for a little Nickelodeon, but she is pretty active.  

I know what you mean about the older kids though, they must be in hiding.  They just don't play like when I was a kid, I was out from dusk to dawn if at all possible.

[ClayL]

While the boy is quite the playstation junkie, he is also a pretty good young outdoorsman. He goes hunting with me and his grandparents, is a dead-eye with his BB gun and a better fisherman than I'll ever be. All I can seem to do is drown the poor bait, while the boy has a 5lb rainbow trout on the wall. Little rat! To me, he is becomming a well rounded kid, who enjoys many different activities.

I'll agree they don't play like when I was a kid. Good thing too! We'd line up on either side of a fresh cow patty and try to pull the other into it among other interesting games. Of course there was no playstation then either. One of the things we did.

Being a bunch of kids on a farm we were pretty beat up most of the time. Well one day my sister, a cousin and I pick a bunch of scabs and wrote on the wall of our treehouse, "We want you dead Wilson!" We told my brother, Wilson, the mafia came by looking for him and we had told them he wasn't in. We said that if he would give us his allowence that we'd keep telling them that. One day dad was late with the allowence and Wilson spilled the beans to my grandfather. We got in some pretty serious trouble and had to give our allowence to him and pay Wilson back the money. Then my grandfather made us go with Wilson to watch him spend our money.

I personally think my parents would have been better off IF we had spent our time with the playstation. I do think that todays kids toys require less imagination thatn they used to. Seems like every toy has to come with a story line. Like kids can't think one up on their own.

CL

[METALGOD8]

None of our neighbors have kids. LOL... They are busybodies and really keep to themselves, unless they see a piece of copper laying next to my driveway, then they call the EPA to make sure it aint radioactive.
My kids go outside and play all day, except in school months. Sometimes they go down the road a ways to a BIG farm and hang out with other kids there, but for the most part, they play here.
I think the favorite past time for them is to find bugs. ALL KINDS. They love to play with them and they even figured out how to preserve them in a glass case they got from the computer recycle pile. Once, they put some cocoon thing in the closet thinking it was dead. About 2 years later, the grub pupae lookin thing was still squirming after they opened the fuzzy spiderweb stuff. It was really rather creepy actually. We still have yet to identify it. lol... They also are fascinated by the F-18s, C-130's, A-6's, (and yes... F-4's) and Harriers, and big ol squadrons of Blackhawk, Apache, Pavelow and Chinook helicopters that fly right above the treetops and shake the windows every day here. They can all spot them as specks. Maybe they'll be fighter pilots one day. lol They have little forts set up, I think they want one of them Blackhawks to land or something.


MG8 :smokin:

[suflowersinamericanow]

I made this same observation about a year ago.  And the reaction people have when you do bring children into public places besides the library is absolutely frightening.

Homeland what?

[Tampa survivor]

My girl is an actress, drama queen and princess extroidinair.  With a snake, or lizard, or god only knows what in her grip/  Critters have not a chance.  Learning to ride 4 wheelers.
Ten year old boy is top student, observannt and in a word, wonderful.  Fishes, hikes, camps, racetracks...you name it.  Gameboy too, but ya gotta take the thing every now and then...
The oldest is a meathead.  14 is supposed to be.  We shall survive.  He has grown into an attitude larger than France.  Off to Moms.  Drive her batty and happy for a while.  
Bob, it is hotter than hell itself, and when 95 degrees and 95% humidity is a 6 month long forecast, my bet is they are in the A/C.  Hell, the bay is 91 degrees or something.  Swimming after lunch makes me sweat!!
Hey everyone...raising kids is doing fine and well.  They aren't any weirder than we were.
Bill