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Where those the days? Is ignorance bliss? I really don’t know.
When I was growing up, we played outside a lot and our curfew was when it was “dark.” We didn’t have cellphones so my mother never knew what we were doing. I don’t remember that she ever even asked. We had implemented the “don’t ask don’t tell” policy long before the Clinton administration.
If I wasn’t outside, my friends and I used to hide out in my bedroom and make prank phone calls for hours. There was no caller ID or call back options and phoning the Corns and asking for the Colonel was the height of hilarity. It never got old. Sometimes I wonder if the Corns miss me.
When I think about all the stuff I did as a kid, I get a panic attack. We live in a different generation and I don’t know if that is a good or bad thing. What was once the norm is completely unheard of now. I often think about the things my mother did that would get me arrested these days.
Like:
1. I never rode a bike or skateboard with a helmet. In my mother’s defense, I don’t think they made them. Same goes for seatbelts. I don’t recall seatbelts in cars. At least, I don’t remember my mom’s Vista Cruiser having seatbelts. Of course, my parent’s cars never had the optional luxury supreme package. Probably the parents who cared about injury thought about safety options. My parents had five kids in ten years. They were too tired to think about traumatic brain injury.
2. Leaving me in a locked car while she ran in and did her grocery shopping. When I remind her of this, she shrugs her shoulders and says, “Well, at least I locked the doors so no one could kidnap you.” Seriously? What about cooking me and my brother in a hundred and fifty degree locked car? Then driving us home without seat belts? Sheesh!
3. Naked pictures. When I think of all the naked pics my mom has of me and my sibs, and all the naked pics I have of my kids, we are both probably looking at double life sentences with no possibility of parole. But come on. Is there anything better than a naked baby bum pic?
What did you do as as a kid that was considered the norm but would get your mother arrested now? Do you miss the good old days of prank phone calling? If not, what do you miss?
79 Comments on “Were those the days?”
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When my girlfriend and I were about 11 or 12 we would get on the city bus and ride it downtown to the mall. We lived in a fairly large town, two little girls on the bus with all kinds of strange people. We were gone all day. Like you said, no cellphones, no checking-in. Crazy. What is strange – it wasn’t crazy at the time!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 2:20 am.
I loved ridding the bus with friends when I was about 11. Never even thought it was crazy.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:35 pm.
No seat belts in the car or bike helmets. Like you said – unheard of.
We would just take off all day & roam the countryside. Some of it pretty dense bushland. We never came to any harm & were always home for meals.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 4:07 am.
Same here. We were always home for dinner. Didn’t get in trouble for roaming around and my mom not knowing where we were, but huge trouble if we were late for dinner.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:37 pm.
I did the same sort of thing (minus the prank phone calls). We played outside until called home for supper. We rode our bikes off everywhere. There was no idea of bike helmets, so we could feel the wind rushing through our hair as we free-wheeled down steep hills. And cars simply did not have seat-belts. I feel sorry for children today – they seem to be allowed no private lives.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 4:13 am.
No phone pranking? Loved it.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:44 pm.
If we got in trouble we got spanked – hard. Many of the kids today could really use a few good hard whacks on the butt because it might teach them some respect. I mouthed off to my mother once and she smacked me across the face a couple of hours before I was to go to youth group and I didn’t end up coming home until about 10pm or so which freaked Mum out and she called the cops. Believe it or not the cop praised Mum for slapping me and thought that more kids needed to be disciplined if they behaved badly. When my sister and I were really little, if we bit someone either Mum or Dad would bite us (not on the face) just to teach us not to bite people if we didn’t like to be bitten.
I really miss the days when you could get change out of 5 cents, it always seemed to me that you got a lot more lollies when they were a cent each.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 5:07 am.
Penny candy! My bother and I used to walk about a mile to a neighborhood market and get five pieces of candy for five cent.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:46 pm.
I agree about the lack of respect these days. We knew better than to talk back. I talked back to my mother twice, once when I was eleven and again when I was twenty and got slapped both times. I should have known better. Although I never got spanked because my mother told my stepfather to leave me alone, he did beat my brothers with a belt. That’s taking it a little too far. But, basically, we all knew our boundaries.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:23 pm.
Yeah, boundaries were very drawn.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:37 pm.
I remember those days of running wild. There was no t.v. so you played outside and you came in either when you were hungry or it was dark. My mother wouldn’t know what we were up to for hours on end. I think those were the best days ever but yeah if she did that now she would have DCF on her doorstep.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 8:07 am.
We had a t.v., but it only had 3 channels. so we didn’t watch it much.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:48 pm.
When I was growing up, the phones had party lines which meant you shared the line…so no prank calls. Actually I picked up the phone to call my grandmother and got yelled at by the neighbor man who was on the phone. I’ve hated talking on the phone ever since. That explains why I had jobs requiring me to answer phones and make calls. We kids would play tag, etc. There were no seat belts, no helmets, no skateboards.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 8:48 am.
We played hide and go seek a lot.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:38 pm.
I lived in a neighborhood of mostly boys so I grew up building go-carts and treehouses. The go-carts had a piece of wood on a string for a brake, the fact we all grew up to adulthood is probably a miracle. Little wonder I got my degree in civil engineering. I could design an AMAZING treehouse now!
I miss the fact that we were not afraid of being on the neighborhood streets in the dark. We ran those streets like little hooligans.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 8:53 am.
I had two older brothers and we played Hot Wheels a lot.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 4:06 pm.
We had one tv in our house. Black and white. It was not allowed to be turned on until all homework was done in the evening. During summer vacation, we would be outside constantly because no air conditioning inside. Mom was a strict disciplinarian. We had a list of chores to be accomplished every day year round. Those were the best times. I still tell stories about the chores we did. Funny my kids are still doing chores around the house. Hmmm!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 8:58 am.
Ug on the chores. I hated doing the dishes. Still do.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 4:07 pm.
We had a stationwagon like in your picture. It didn’t have shoulder belts, just a lap belt. We also used to ride backwards in the third row/trunk space thing. I think the biggest thing that was different is that everyone in the neighborhood knew each other. I currently live in a similar neighborhood but other than a hi with a wave we don’t know 98% of the neighbors. It makes it rather sterile and unfriendly. Our HOA now is not like the one my parents dealt with where the neighborhood had get togethers and what not. Oh and street lights.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:02 am.
I remember the third row seat. We never opened it. Just rolled around in the back.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 4:09 pm.
My parents had a green station wagon and we’d lower the tail gate and sit on it when we went anywhere. Today…well, I’m sure most of our parents would be in prison for the things we did back then!
We got spanked for disobeying and I didn’t grow up to be a mass murderer. I think DH & I both turned out pretty well for all the abuse; er, I mean discipline we suffered at the hands of our parents.
I miss playing in the street. We played dodge ball and Red Rover. We rode our bikes on busy streets. We played hide & seek until way after dark but our dads were right there on the porch steps keeping an eye on us. Kids today don’t know the freedom we had back then.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:08 am.
Dodge ball. There were always more boys in my neighborhood than girls. So, dodge ball wasn’t one of my favs.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 4:11 pm.
I often say to my mom “What were you thinking?” and she shrugs. Like you I was out from dawn to dusk, wherever. We used to put pennies on the train tracks then stand right there and wait while the train ran them over. Then ride our bikes down perpendicular hills at tops speed. I shudder.
But when I hear what IV and his bros were up to I ask “Where was your mother?” They were really up to some scary stuff.
I do miss the days when kids could run around outside all day without a care. Herds of children running free, getting heat stroke. Yep, those were the days.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:10 am.
We used to put pennies on the tracks too!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:07 pm.
I lived on a hill and used our shoes as brakes. Very scary.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:48 pm.
We had chores, we were expected to do them right after homework. Our allowance was we got to pick out a book or a piece of candy.
When I said that to an 11 year old, and followed it up with the fact we had to actually milk a cow before heading in to school…he looked at me like I was nuts.
TV time was rationed. They wanted us to “go play outside” which much like you should have been “go outside and try and not kill yourself.”
We rode in the back of the truck, were watched by our patently underage siblings, parents didn’t stay home when school was out.
However, I did grow up in a small town where everyone watched and narc’d on the kids. If you went out of your driveway and didn’t look both ways, before you reached your destination there had been 3 phone calls to your parents.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:25 am.
I remember riding in the back of the pick up. If there were more then 4 of us an old couch was thrown in the back of the pick up and off you went. At least they put the cover on the back, though. So, we at least had a little protection.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:46 am.
If we didn’t “go outside” my mom gave us chores. We went outside.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:50 pm.
Seeing a picture of that stationwagon reminds me of a time that my mom left me alone in our stationwagon. It was running. I somehow managed to put the car into neutral and it rolled down the driveway, across the road and down a little hill into the neighbors yard. Luckily no one was hurt.
Honestly they probably could have been arrested every time they left me alone with my brothers. I never did the prank call thing, but remember many others you told of.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:28 am.
Too funny. I wonder what your neighbors thought of your car in their yard.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:51 pm.
I was a latch key kid. Those were the best times. Coming home after school and watching the little black & white tv on the counter to an empty house. Those were the days. In the summer, mom bought a pool pass and told me to just go. Mom hates water and after she got us swimming well, we were expected to walk down on our own and get ourselves home. Back then, I got my learner’s permit to drive at 14. I got my first job and my dad let me drive one of the old cars that he had. Those were the best times. I wish my kids could start learning to drive that early so that they at least have some experience behind the wheel when they go to college.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:31 am.
oh, and when my kids were babies, Mom wanted the traditional ‘baby in the bathtub’ pic. I had to artfully arrange the bubbles so that we weren’t labeled pervs.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:33 am.
Ahh, the summer pool pass. I spent many summers spent at the local pool.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:52 pm.
One of the big laughs in my family now is that my mom would send all four of us outdoors and lock the door. She says that she just needed to rest a little and it wasn’t “that long.” My oldest sister became apoplectic about it as an adult. “You sent your four children, 8 and under, outside and LOCKED THE DOOR?” I think it’s hilarious.
But I wouldn’t do that today.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:34 am.
Yes! We had a babysitter that locked me and her two kids outside during the day so that we wouldn’t mess up the house. This was during the summer in Houston!!!! To this day, I can’t believe that my parents paid her to do that!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:03 pm.
LOL. I WANTED to lock my kids out, but was afraid of CPS,
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:53 pm.
My mother let my sister and I do so many things that I wouldn’t dare let my daughters do now.
I remember my parents playing cards until all hours of the morning with their friends and all of the kids just running wild. There was no bedtime. You just put your head down when you got tired. I remember sleeping in a fort that we made, in the woods when I was 7 and my sister was 12. We had our 2 best friends with us and a couple of sleeping bags. The only thing our parents told us was that there were to be no fires. Well, how do you keep warm without a fire? So, we snuck a pack of matches and had a fire. No harm. We spent the entire night out there, but I was so scared. All you could hear in the distance were wolves howling. We could pretty much do anything on those weekends, as long as we left the adults alone to play cards.
I miss those days. Things seemed so simple and we had so much fun the 4 of us. Whenever we get together, which isn’t very often now, we have fun telling stories about the crazy things we used to do.
My friends and I would do prank calls at birthday parties. I remember ordering pizza and giving fake numbers and addresses.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:41 am.
I never pranked pizzas, but did pretend a fake accent sometimes.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:55 pm.
Oh man, we have this discussion with my mom all the time. We were farm kids…..worked hard and player harder. When it was “playtime” we had free run of the country. We used to meet the neighbor kids (who lived 5 miles south of us) halfway between our places at a creek to catch minnows then sneak into another neighbors pasture to fish in the pond. Sometimes we fell in, sometimes we just went swimming….in any case, we’d come home, covered in mud, and Mom would shrug and tell US to hose off outside before coming into the house.
We also had a “spare the rod, spoil the child” philosophy…as it turns out, all 5 of US are well adjusted, successful adults. If anything, it taught us to analyze the potential fallout before we did something that would bring down the wrath of Mama.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:46 am.
My mom would leave us rowdy kids in the car to rune back in the house for something. No big deal, right? The car parking spot was in the backyard adjacent to the river bank. Of course, my brother once knocked it into Drive. Someone showed up in time to stop our slow roll to the river.
There was the time when as a noodle-spined 4 yo leaning on the car door, it swung open as Mom slowly turned a corner. I got a little scraped, no biggie but Mom was sure panicky about that one. The result – not seat belts, but a reminder not to lean on the door.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:46 am.
We had that very car, only in yellow.
We grew up in the same time period. No helmets, no curfew, no cell phone, crazy pranks.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 9:52 am.
I had to laugh at your blog today. So very true of my childhood. Two songs came to mind while I was reading today: A Different World by Bucky Covington: “We were born to mothers who smoked and drank, our cribs were covered in lead based paint” are the opening lines (does that tell you anything?) and Do You Remember These by The Statler Brothers. That’s a fun song and YES, I do remember all (or most) of the things mentioned in the song.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 10:00 am.
19 something by Mark Wills is another one if you grew up in the 70′s and 80′s…it makes me laugh every time!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 10:10 am.
Oh, girl!! We rode around in the back of Daddy’s truck. All the time, too! In the summers, we would leave the house when we woke up, and not come home until the street lights were on unless it was raining, then we hid in someone’s bedroom and played records all day waiting until 3 for the WB Looney Tunes cartoons to come on. We drank unfiltered and unsoftened water out of the water hose, rode bikes (and motorcycles) without helmets, rode in cars without seatbelts while Mom and Dad smoked in the car with the windows up and drank a can of beer. And, if you put one TOE out of line, my mother would tan my a** with Daddy’s belt. None of us put that toe out of line very much because we all hated getting caught, spanked and grounded. I remember a story my sister told me about when she was 7 and Mother had fussed at her about something and turned around just in time to see my sister sticking her tongue out at her–she popped her chin up and made her bite her tongue so hard it bled, but she never stuck her tongue out where Mother could see her anymore. Yep, I think they would get arrested nowadays.
I can honestly count on 1 hand how many times I had to get spanked–I had a good healthy fear of getting in trouble, and it seems like there aren’t too many kids that worry about getting in trouble nowadays.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 10:08 am.
Oh, and the baby bum pics–LOVE those!! I have a few of Munchkin Girl already.
There was a postcard around Texas a few years back with a naked little baby boy with wee cowboy boots, a wee cowboy hat, and his bare little butt there for all the world to see–it was precious! 
Posted on March 1, 2013 at 12:19 am.
My mother would have been in jail for spanking the crap out of my second youngest brother.. He was our Dennis the Menace kid. Always getting in trouble.. But it was always the “This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you” scenario.
And we never had to worry about seatbelts and sometimes my little brother, because he was dubbed the runt of the litter, would curl up on the back window of the car and fall asleep.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 10:10 am.
OMG… you’re all talking about the dark ages, aren’t you!! Yup.. I lived them… Rode bikes all over, out til dark.. My folks took us camping in 1963-4.. I was the third & youngest child.. got to sit in the middle of the back seat of the station wagon.. In case of a car accident, my sisters were told to put their arms out in front of me… They had seatbelts, but there wasn’t one for me. I’ve always wondered if they would catch me or not… they claim they would…
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 11:19 am.
Hi Rachel -
“Back in the day” if a child turned 5 before Dec. 31st they started kindergarten that September which means since my birthday is the end of November I was four when I first started walking to school.
Walk! You ask. Yes we actually had to walk to school. We also had to walk home for lunch and then to school before walking home at the end of the day. We didn’t have any buses to take us to school so you either walked, rode your bike, roller skated (the kind that you attached to the bottom of your shoes) or paid to take a “public” bus.
My grade school was a mile away from home so I got can’t remember anyone being over weight. We didn’t have gym classes like they do now but instead had a break in the morning and afternoon when we outside to play.
“Back in the day” you better not have forgotten your homework or you’d have to stay after school for “detention” and do the work then. Of course you’d still get an “F” for not getting it in on time but you were held responsible for your actions.
Thinks sure have changed since then!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 11:38 am.
I grew up five minutes from the beach. In the summer holidays when ALL our parents were at work. My friends and I spent all day on the beach. We could all swim and never even thought of danger. A group of kids none of us older than 14yrs. Anyone older than that would have been working. We had a great time. If parents went to work at 7am and got home at 6pm like they did then the social would charge them with neglect.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 11:39 am.
I grew up in a small town and I did pretty much the same thing as you when I was a kid. Sleeping outside in the front yard because I did not have a back yard(grandma’s house was in the back/next door). During the summer staying outside until the sun sets. My brother was a lot older then me and He has 5 kids and they would cram all five in a small car that would sit five. so in the back set there would be 4 kids and in the front with them would be the baby. Some times I would go with them and there would be 5 of us in the back and three in the front. AND no Set Belts. And the Spanking OH MAN I would not be able to sit for a few hours. Now you cannot spank or hit your kids for what they did.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 11:45 am.
Yup, I remember those days too. We would stay out until dinner, then go back out after dark to play hide and seek. We feared the neighbors too – because they wouldn’t hesitate to let our parents know if we got into trouble. My mom used to send us to walk to the center of town to get milk and groceries for her. I was like 10. I would NEVER let my kids do that today.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:10 pm.
I know if they ever do a brain scan the indention of “Oldsm” will show up on my forehead from where the one-arm safety catch missed me a few times.
I remember my mom and her friend would get the front seat and load six plus kids, all standing up, in the back seat to go “into town” for shopping.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:14 pm.
I swear you musta’ heard my friend’s and mine phone convo this morning. I’m one of ten kids and we had a station wagon that we ALL piled into. Of course, we didn’t wear seat belts! There weren’t enough if we wanted to.
The worst was when it was hot out, my parents would roll up the windows and say…Keep the windows up…the AC is on. Meanwhile, they were (and still are to this day) chain smokers! We would all get car sick and they would say: WE HAVE THE WINGS OPEN!! (Remember wings?? HAHAHAHA)
Anyway…
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:23 pm.
Wow, I could write an entire epistle about this subject!!
1. Bike helmets. You’re right, they didn’t exist then. And for my brother and I, handle bars might as well have not existed either. I learned to ride my 10-speed sitting up, without hands on the grips. I turned corners by “leaning into the curve” so to speak. The only time I used the handle bars was to use the brakes. Never fell, either. I recently told my mother about this and she nearly had a heart attack!!
2. Tree Climbing. As a girl, I was a champion tree climber. There was a tree in our neighborhood that was perfect for this. It had a “crow’s nest” about 30’ or so up and was an easy climb for a nimble child. It had a perfect view of the neighborhood and was a great spot for reading as well. I doubt my parents knew that I climbed up there. There were lower branches that they caught me on.
3. Fort / Sanctuary. There was a field not too far from my house where the wild grass grew to about 4’ tall. You could lay down on your back in the grass and literally disappear from the world. My sister and I would take Cokes and books and tramp down a small clearing and spend a summer afternoon reading and talking. Sheer bliss!!
4. Seatbelts. What on earth were those?? We also had five kids in the family and a station wagon to boot. We took family vacations every summer and I remember stretching out across the folded down back seat with pillows and blankets while we traveled through the night. I also sometimes sat in the front seat between my parents (I was small then). Of course, cars were made of actual metal then, instead of the plastic that they use these days so families were safer in crashes.
5. Childhood games. When I was growing up, in the summer, we were out the door no later than 9am. Our curfew was “when the streetlights come on,” but on a hot summer night, we sometimes still played in the backyard. Games like Ghost in the Graveyard, Statues and Kick the Can required darkness to be effective. My mother never worried about her chicks when we played in the backyard after dark. We were safe and our friends were safe as well and their parents knew it.
6. Treks to the City. In my teens, my sister and I used to take the train to Chicago. Sometimes we would go to the Museum of Science and Industry, one of our favorite places in the world. Sometimes we would just go to O’Hare and people watch. In the winter, we would go to see the Christmas windows at Marshall Fields. We never had problems. If my mother worried, she never let on.
7. Discipline. My dad has HUGE hands. And a temper. And little patience for smart mouths. My mom has “the Look,” AKA the “evil eye.” We got that first and then my dad took over. Result: five well adjusted, well-educated adults, none of whom have ever been behind bars.
Times were so much simpler then, more innocent, easier to live as children. If I could, I would take my nieces and nephews back to that time and let them experience what it felt like.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:39 pm.
I should be scarred for life with all the crap I pulled. Yet I lived to tell the tale. Rode my bike to the beach alone (14 miles away). And a helmet? Had never even heard of them.
Hitchhiked.
Got my legs switched with a tree branch all the way home after a particular disappearing act. AND got paddled by the vice pricipal of our Jr. High on another occasion.
And managed to stay alive swimming alone in our pool while my mom and a neighbor got totally snockered on Thunderbird wine one summer day and passed out.
Those were the good old days!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 12:50 pm.
Well….there are TOO many things that my mother would get arrested for…I don’t think smokin a dube while you are supposed to be watching your kids is ALWAYS the best idea!!But hey…I turned out ok!!
I’d say I miss kinds just playing outside, and not being stuck in front of the television with video games all day!! Play Man Hunt, get outside, remember what that green stuff is…yeah its grass….go roll around in it!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:01 pm.
Helmets? Not only did I not wear one when I rode my bicycle, I didn’t wear one while perched atop an English hunter going over hedges and fences, sometimes on the horse and sometimes BEFORE the horse.
We rode from Alabama to Pennsylvania in the back of a station wagon with blankets, pillows, books, games, a cooler of food and drinks and a very amiable dachshund. (He made a great pillow.) No seat belts and the only bathroom breaks were when we stopped for gas or food.
We were out of the house at the crack of dawn and didn’t come home until dark. My Mom, however, always knew where to find us.
We climbed enormous horse chestnut trees, raced our bikes down a lethally steep hill and did things that I look back at now and think “Why aren’t we dead?”
My Mom would whack us with whatever was in her hand – a wooden spoon, a screen-door style fly swatter, a shoe, a hairbrush – she once chased one of my brothers through the house with a saran wrap box. We had chores and if they didn’t get done we were punished. We received a small allowance which we were allowed to spend on toys, books, candy once a week. No chores done, any bad behavior or bad grades – no allowance. Period.
We came straight home from school and did our homework FIRST. No exceptions.
And like ladydawg my parents managed to raise three gainfully employed useful citizens.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:03 pm.
We really did have it better in so many ways than the kids do now. We ran wild, after chores, and never worried about whether or not we would be safe. Lord help you if you told mom and dad you were going to do one thing and did another because back then NO ONE stepped in to stop a parent tanning your hide.Sass my mom? I liked living much too much for that piece of stupidity.
Everyone knew everyone and the grown-ups would rat you out in a heartbeat. When we were teens we would stay at home while the adults went away for the weekend but by the time they drove into the driveway they knew exactly what we had or hadn’t done. Mom would walk in the house and put out her hand for the car keys and we knew she knew we had been dragging Main all weekend and had run across the state line to visit boys and gone to the lake. I loved the freedom I don’t dare give our g-sons.
One tv and daddy ruled the channels, all four of them. Two phones, one in the living room and one in the laundry room downstairs, no calls after 8:30 and we had a 10 minute limit.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:13 pm.
One thing my mother did I think back on now that was horrid happened when I was five and had my dad’s side of the family up in arms. She left me and my two-year-old brother alone in a movie theater. My parents were already divorced by then, so when she didn’t have a babysitter she left us alone a number of times from what I remember.
Leia is almost five now and we wouldn’t think of leaving her in a movie theater by herself. Or alone at home.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:34 pm.
When my sis and I were little and we drove to my grandparents’ house, my parents would put a custom-made plank over the back seat of the Plymouth so we could lie down and sleep on the way home. We’d just roll around in the back of that car for an hour or more, each way. On the freeway. We all thought it was ingenious.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 1:41 pm.
Riding in the back of the pickup was so fun!!!! Part of me wishes that my kids could feel that freedom. I think parents worried less then, which is a good thing.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 2:21 pm.
there were 5 of us. I was the youngest. By the time I was 6, my parents would leave overnight or longer with my brother and oldest sister in charge. My broher was 19. No, not arrestable today but no one would do it, I think.
More shocking is that at age 5 I walked a half mile to school alone. Even I am a little shocked
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 2:28 pm.
So many of these stories are familiar. With 7 kids we had a full size van – 2 big, bench seats with 3 seatbelts a piece that never were used until became the law. There was extra space in the back, so my dad built a platform that was carpeted. We’d sleep up there on road trips. All the luggage was below it.
During the summers we’d be gone all day. We just had to be home for dinner – or call that we wouldn’t be home for dinner. I’d be at my best friend’s house all day within no adult supervision when we were 7 and 8 because parents worked. I think her older sisters were supposed to be watching us, but I don’t really remember them being around.
Or we’d be out wandering the Montana countryside. I remember picking chokecherries, but not telling my mom that the bush was under a railroad trestle when she asked where we found them. The vague point to the south was good enough for her.
We rode our bikes EVERYWHERE.
When I started kindergarten I walked with my older brother and sister to school. Since it was a half day my dad would be pick up. He was on shift work and was remodeling our house himself with some friends. It was about a month or two into the school year, and he forgot me at school one day. So I walked the 4 blocks home by myself, and I was never picked up from school, again, because I could clearly walk home by myself. It’s one of the busiest streets in my hometown, too.
In the winter my mom rarely gave us rides to school. It had to be below zero for that to happen. We’d all be bundled up. At one time the high school had these temporary bungalows set up on a small hill with raingutters going down the hill, ending at the sidewalk. In the winter those gutters got really icy. We’d climb up the hill where there was about a 6-8″ of a level space to stand on next to the building. Then, we’d slide down the raingutters. The trick was to be able to stop before you slid into the street. There were a few times someone slid into the street, but no one ever got hit or even close to being hit by a car.
I was left behind twice. Seven kids are hard to keep track of, unless, you start counting, but even then, that’s not always perfect. Once we were in downtown in Montana’s largest city before it was cleaned up at JCPenneys. My second youngest sister hadn’t made it out of the store. My mom was counting us in the van – like 4 times like another kid was going to pop up like whackamole or something. Then, she started calling out our names. She went back into the store, and found my sister pushing that toy with the balls that pop up, in front of the escalator – completely oblivious to the fact she nearly got left in a town 2.5 hours from our home.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 2:33 pm.
I remember those days! This hits home right now because my husband just told me about his colleague’s newborn. It seems the doctor told them the the baby is sleeping too much on one side so they need to rotate the baby so she’s sleeping on her other side or she will get a dent in her head. I told him I have no idea how we grew up relatively unharmed. If anyone had suggested to my mother or aunts that they possibly wake a sleeping baby to turn them over they would have threatened them with bodily harm.
My favorite is we had a station wagon with a rear facing seat. We would go on long road trips where my sister and I were in that seat facing the car behind us (often waving or making faces), nothing but the rear windsheild keeping us from flying out. On really long trips my mother would put a mattress in the back of the car and we would sleep while my dad drove. No one thought anything of it and we had a great time.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 3:11 pm.
The evidence of naked pictures are now in my possession – done are the years of my mother showing “the goods” to my boyfriend.
I remember playing in the dark, lighting firecrackers – even the big ones, going for a walk and never saying a word – even in the times of kidnappers always being on the “prowl”. If someone knew me or my family I could always jump in their car (while my sister a few years younger had to learn a password to know it was safe to get in — which makes me wonder if my parents cared if I was taken).
I used to ride on the handlebars of bikes, ride without helmet on a motorcycle, learned to drive at 12 in a pick up truck.
There was a biker bar that used to have the best sandwiches, I would drive around the corner (around 14 years old) walk in and pick up the order and drive back — I remember everything stopping and staring the moment I walked in.
I drag raced on back roads, I car surfed all without a thought, even doing hill jumping like I was a Duke (cue theme song).
No one knew where I was, what I was doing – yet I wasn’t a bad kid, hardly got in trouble (or at least didn’t get caught), even took candy from strangers and it never killed me. I learn to shot and firearm safety and never thought about hurting someone. Would go night fishing crawling home with a bucket of fish when the sun rose.
The world is definitely different – my children have to have me go through 3 passwords so they can go on the computer, I have tracking on their phones (shhh, don’t tell), I often tell them to go outside to get the house off of them. I miss the freedom of being young and I feel sorry for children nowadays – I recall a game would just happen in the middle of the road with friends, now children have teams and practice they must go to. I remember drive ins and roller rinks they only see those in movies or their video games. They learn Microsoft so young when at that age I learned cross stitch and crochet. Sometimes I wish they would go out and do the things I did with the freedom I had – as long as I don’t know about it and they don’t get caught and it doesn’t kill them.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 3:20 pm.
Lol! Oh, the naked baby bum pics. Oh yes. I have some of those and I frequently blackmail my daughter with them. She’ll do a lot of dishes to keep those things in the photo box.
We used to ride in my parent’s station wagon while the seats were all folded flat. Forget seat belts, we didn’t even use the seats! If they’d had a wreck, we’d have all gone flying through the front windshield. Bad momma!
We played outdoors a LOT and were allowed to wander wherever we wanted – and go inside of anyone’s house – so long as we were within sight of our house. Now, our house was up on a hill, so we could see it from a long, long way away. Whenever my mom wanted us home, she’d ring this huge ship’s bell that my dad had installed on a big post. Good thing none of my neighbors were serial killers or child molesters.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 3:28 pm.
Well, I used to take cabs and buses by myself in Bangkok as a thirteen-year-old. None of us ever thought twice about it.
I also played in a back yard that occasionally had a cobra run through it (or a pit viper or a banded krait, all of which are deadly). I was telling my husband the other day that it’s a miracle we didn’t all die, growing up in the jungle with snakes everywhere. Fortunately, most snakes don’t like people any better than people like them.
With the exception of cobras–they WILL chase you. So my parents had an instruction for us if we ever came across a cobra. We were to run away in a zigzag, because supposedly cobras can’t turn easily.
Yep, that was their solution to the problem of cobras in our back yard. As I said–it’s a miracle I made it to adulthood!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 3:58 pm.
We (7 of us kids) were not allowed on the phone. And, if we had made prank calls, my mom would have whipped our butts. And, these days, she would have had DHR/social services called on her. I do miss the discipline that kids need these days. I am very thankful that my mom cared enough to give us the discipline that we needed. We had to stay on our block and couldn’t road the neighborhood. And if she said she would come out there with a belt or switch, she MEANT it. I never got in trouble at school as I didn’t wish to be paddled and I knew if I did, that I would get the same at home. These days kids are not afraid of their parents. I wanted my son to be afraid of me – good discipline.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 5:41 pm.
I miss the old days sometimes! There was a simple-ness and a peace that you just don’t have anymore.
My Mom smoked in the car, windows up, and we rode around breathing that in, while not wearing seatbelts.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 6:56 pm.
(sorry didn’t finish my post) And back then, everyone smoked – everywhere, so no one thought anything of it ….but now-a-days, smoking is almost a crime.
I LIKE there being smoke free places, don’t get me wrong, I’m just saying that back then it wasn’t that big of a deal, like the seatbelt thing, etc….
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 6:58 pm.
Many of the things same as you…though my mom would have left us in the car with the windows down, like the dog.
We went trick or treating without supervision.
And now that I have my beach cruiser bicycle I still ride without a helmet (on paths with little car traffic) and feel guilty…but free!
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 7:44 pm.
Fricking computer just backed me off the internet in the middle of my comment.
Seatbelts came out in the mid 60s, so dad’s 1969 Pontiac had them; tucked under the seat so they were out of the way.
Unsure when helmets for bikes or horses started. Had neither, should have had one for the horse. At least my horse accidents did not have brain injury, just broken arm; twice.
We had 60 acres to play on. We might have been in the barn or back in the pasture. The way my parents kept us out of the creek was to tell us that the creek was full of blood suckers and would latch on to our legs and suck out all of our blood.
We did not need permission to play at the neighbors across the street, but we did if we wanted to play at the school; it was 1/4 mile down the road.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 11:08 pm.
We walked or rode our bikes to school. It was rare for our parents to take us to school. I remember a few times being dropped off at the intersection; mom turned left and I walked straight across the road. There were not crossing guards back then.
One of my favorite memories of elementary school after we got new neighbors where we used to rent horse pasture. It was kinda funny, the middle daughter was born 10 years and a day after my brother and the youngest was born 9 years 364 days after me. Any way, my mom (Margo) and the neighbor (Terrie) would sometimes pick me and the eldest daughter up from school on horseback. Margo had the middle daughter, Terrie had the youngest and I would take the eldest (first grader) with me.
I do not think the school would approve of parents doing that these days.
Posted on February 28, 2013 at 11:25 pm.
Paddling probably would have CPS calling at our home!
For my four years of high school, every football sea-
son would find me going all the way across town (with
a transfer midway) to the stadium where our HS football
games were played. Once the game was over, I’d hop back
on a bus and reverse the trip to get home. These trips
were made by myself with all kinds of people on the
buses. There was no chance of not being noticed because
I was wearing my drum & bugle corps uniform! I nearly
always rode with the same drivers and I am thankful
to them. They kept an eye out for me and provided
protection for me!
Pat C.
Posted on March 1, 2013 at 12:08 am.
Oh I remember the prank calls. Asking if they had Prince Albert in a can…then you better let him out. Is your refrigerator running? Better go catch it cuz it just ran across the yard. Yea they were dumb but what fun when you’re young.
We folded the back seat down in our station wagon, rolled out the sleeping bags and journeyed from Calif to Kansas to visit the grandparents.
I also slept in the driveway with my girlfriend in our VW camper. We thought we were sooooo cool.
Posted on March 1, 2013 at 12:25 am.
My sisters and I used to fight over who got to either stand next to my dad while he was driving (arm around his neck) or lie across the back dash. Lying on the back dash at night was the best – you could watch the stars while on long family drives. We must have been pretty young to be short enough to do either of those things. Seat belts? We used to get in trouble for playing with them. They had to stay in their holders over the top of the door.
Posted on March 1, 2013 at 3:22 am.
I miss how my parents would let me disappear on the four-wheeler for hours at a time, bat out of hell speeds, no helmet, through cornfields and prairie grass and neighbors’ property. My mother is the most OCD woman I know, yet that was considered a safe activity? Fantastic. Or the way my dad would get it in his head that his daughter “Needed to learn sooner than later” how to drive a car at the age of ten. Needless to say, I was not in trouble when the cheap siding of our silver Subaru scraped across the wood post that held our single security light in the middle of Nowhere, Iowa.
Oh, the days.
Posted on March 2, 2013 at 5:59 am.
hi,there
Posted on April 9, 2013 at 11:04 pm.
watch the newet movie scarymovie5 here:
Posted on April 9, 2013 at 11:31 pm.