Looping the Hen

To Baby or Not To Baby?

*Cough* I was going to post this, well, someday when I had it more thought through and some statistics, but I find myself prodded by folks who should instead be sewing wings or beer wench outfits or some such! Crazy world indeed!

I hear all the horror stories of kidnapped, killed, raped, abused and other harms that come to children left alone. Part of me wonders if the world is really that much worse than when I was growing up, or simply more aware due to our sensationalized media addiciton. Glenn Reynolds, the world's most popular (at least the most read) Libertarian, mentions that in TN, the State considers leaving a 9-year old alone is neglect. Although I know it is likely true in our era of Parenting Police, I find the notion preposterous, and a little sickening. The article offers a possible explanation for declining birth rates, while other writings of his explain the danger of negative population growth, such as exists in most of Europe today.

The concept of having children in such a world is so vastly different from the one I have envisioned for most of my adult years, it is causing me to rethink the whole idea. When I was nine, I was going to Pierson Middle School (4th/5th) in the sleepy little town I grew up in, population circa 9000. Unless I had to be home for some reason, or it was below -10F, I walked. It is around 3 miles home (I always thought it was more, but Google just corrected me), depending on the route. G-Max and I would often walk or bike to his house, which was only about a mile away, or head to the library to play chess or stratego for a couple of hours.

Between the hours of 3pm and 6pm on school days, my friends and I had near total freedom to do what we wanted. Sure, we spent thousands of hours in front of the TV, but we also spent it reading, wandering through Kenny's, (our random dollar type store) playing all sorts of games, fooling around in the back yard and the trails behind my house, and otherwise just generally being kids. On the weekends we even occasionally took bike rides to other towns around 9 or 10 miles away to buy comic books or to play video games at the Saybrook Bowling Alley.

Was I a little bit of a latchkey kid? Yes. Do I think my mom or dad neglected me? Nope. Thinking back and looking at the situation today, I honor Mom for respecting me enough to trust in my decisions as early as 8 or 9 years old. Do I want to be stuck to my children's every waking moment for 14 or 15 years before ever letting them be their own person? No, not even a little bit. I don't believe I would be the independent and self-reliant person I am had I not had the freedom when I was younger to learn to enjoy being by myself or with my friends without constant supervision.

If I do have children, I for one want them to understand independence and not need anything other than their own imaginations to be able to enjoy themselves. One of the statistics I had meant to look up was the number of grown men between 25 and 35 that are still living with their parents. If I recall, the number was something horrific, like a third or more.

Did I screw things up on occasion? Oh yes. The worst incident actually occurred when I was older (15 or 16 I think). (Using Lysol and a lighter to kill a bug on the window is not the brightest idea ever) But even though I had the freedom to screw up, I rarely did. When I was living with my father for my last two years of high school, I didn't really have a curfew. Why? Because I never abused the privilege and gave him a need to implement one. And I think that is the way it should be. To learn to be worthy of trust, one has to be trusted.

If I do have children, I hope I allow them as much freedom as mine did me. I hope I instill into them the characteristics that will make them worthy of it. And I hope our society moves away from the mentality that we have to be omnipresent in our kids lives, or at least filling it with all conceivable manner of extra-curricular activity. I used to wish I grew up in my father's time in, of all places, Plainfield, CT, another sleepy little town. TV was not an option. When I hear his stories about him and his brothers, and kids with names like Digger and Johnnie (Knight, actually), I am jealous of the life they had.