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Did Your Parents Know?


Razors Edge

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...or even care how you got to school?

I don't think mine cared past age 10 or so, and really only "confirmed" there was a bus or similar to get us there for that period.  They just hustled us out the door and expected to see us again around 3pm.

I remember once, walking to school with my older sister, me in 2nd grade, her in 4th, and we were convinced someone was trying to "get us" so we ran the last 1/2 mile or so to school. We probably mentioned it to my parents later, but they probably just told us to stay safe and pay attention next time.

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I remember walking through the woods in early grade school. Then the bus, then driving the junky old car. Once in a while we walked to high school, which was a real workout!  Up a big hill and far far away!  Hmm, we had to be late those few days!  I can’t imagine starting early enough to make it. 
BTW, talking about this this HAS to be the definition of being old!  :D (But it was only uphill one way and no snow, so there!)  Now college, THAT was flat but SNOW!  They put us freshman men in Siberia!  We had to plow our own cow path across the open fields of drifting snow  Sort if sun actually.  Like a York peppermint patty!

 

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37 minutes ago, BR46 said:

Mom didn't care what happened on the way to school, what happened in school or on the way home. 

I sort of wonder now when (if?) my parents would have even started to worry.  Dinner time?  My dad got home at 5pm, and we ate by 6pm, so somewhere in there, one of my parents might wonder where one or all of us were?  Probably would just assume playing with friends and maybe my mom would stick her head out the door yelling for us to come home?  I doubt they would bother calling around to friends houses.

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She knew. My elementary school was really close. Walk to the end of my street, go left, walk maybe 50 yards.  I walked alone from 1st grade to 5th. 

Jr high was about 2  miles away so I rode my bike. My mom worked early when inwas in HS so didn’t see me leave but the HS was next door so also rode my bike.

When it was raining my mom would give me a ride to school so I wouldn’t be wet all day but I had to walk home.  In HS I had a buddy with a car who would give me a ride on rainy days. 

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We lived 10 miles from school.  I rode the bus for 12 years (except most all afternoons during HS where there was football, basketball, baseball).  An hour ride in the morning, maybe an hour ride in the afternoon and for the last 3 years a half hour each way to a vo-tech school mid-day.  Many days I was on the a bus for 3 hours a day, always 2 hours minimum.

Living on a road that many times didn't get plowed, there were lots of days every winter that the bus didn't attempt our road.  There was basketball and if you didn't go to school you didn't play or practice and if you missed practice you didn't play.  I remember several days where I took the snowmobile a couple miles to a friends house to catch the bus there so I didn't miss.  If the bus didn't come I had about 15 minutes to get to his place for a different bus.

 

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Oh and we drove our kids to school. I live about 1.5 miles from where I grew up but the elementary school that serviced my neighborhood closed so they went to my school.  Kinda of a long walk on busy roads so we drove them. Same with Jr High & HS but my daughter did get her license right when she could at 15.5 YO and we had a car for her so she drove her & our son.  

My son was a PITA and didn’t get his license until he was 18. The summer between HS & college I told him you need to get your license as there is no way in hell I’m driving you to college… Those 5 AM weight room sessions in HS sucked balls too…

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I walked to school just about always.  I'd guess unless it was raining a LOT, or below zero.  

If I lived about 3 more houses away from HS, I could have rode on the bus.  I not sure if that would have been good or bad.  It was just short of a 1 1/2 mile walk.

I remember walking to school when I was in 2nd grade.  Probably less than a 1/2 mile walk.  For some reason I was going to be late. That scared me to death.  More accurately, the nun that was the teacher scared me.  So rather than go to school late and experience the wrath of a nun, I hid out behind the gymnasium building.  I was found a few hours later.  Everyone was looking for me, the nuns, the police, and my parrents.  Yeah... I'll never forget that day, and that was in 1962.

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1 hour ago, Razors Edge said:

...or even care how you got to school?

I don't think mine cared past age 10 or so, and really only "confirmed" there was a bus or similar to get us there for that period.  They just hustled us out the door and expected to see us again around 3pm.

I remember once, walking to school with my older sister, me in 2nd grade, her in 4th, and we were convinced someone was trying to "get us" so we ran the last 1/2 mile or so to school. We probably mentioned it to my parents later, but they probably just told us to stay safe and pay attention next time.

One of the parents on our block would drive us to elementary school and, by 2nd grade, we'd walk home.  But Americans had a much higher character back in the 50's and 60's and no one worried about little boys or girls being accosted back then.

In 1963-64, another 8th grader named Charles and I were given extra time on Fridays after lunch to walk a bag of money for the nuns 1/2 mile through lower-middle class neighborhoods to a bank and deposit it. We took shortcuts through back alleys, etc. It was $300 to $600 ($2500 to $5000 in 2021 dollars).  No one ever considered that we were being put in danger and we never were!

It's a different USA now though it's not different in the large cities or most advanced nations.  Something's seriously wrong socially that needs correcting: we claim to cherish freedom while not letting our kids play outside by themselves, keeping our doors locked and being afraid to go outside at night!

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Walked to elementary school grades 1-5

Started riding the bus from grades 6-9.  Bus stop was our front yard, so they knew...  It was nice to be able to either sit inside in cold or wet weather or hang out with friends in nice weather.  And of course, friends could come in and wait if it was bad out.

Rode the bus from 6th grade through my freshman year

I was lucky and got a car when I turned 16, so after that, I got myself to school and work and wherever I needed to be, and some places I did not need to be.

This was close what my Nova looked like,
image.thumb.png.92786a257aeb575e6834359f0e65028f.png

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50 minutes ago, MickinMD said:

It's a different USA now though it's not different in the large cities or most advanced nations.  Something's seriously wrong socially that needs correcting: we claim to cherish freedom while not letting our kids play outside by themselves, keeping our doors locked and being afraid to go outside at night!

That’s why I live where I live.

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51 minutes ago, donkpow said:

I forget how many miles it was but I had to carry a baritone horn and a briefcase full of books to and from school when I was a freshman. Made me the man I am today.

child-with-tuba.jpg

My wife always said she had to walk an hour through the woods to get to HS.  I called BS on her but one year while visiting she had her mom drop her off at their old house.  She then said buy the kids lunch & meet us at Robinson High in an hour. 

Sumbitch it was pretty much an hour walk and a good part of it was on a dirt trail through the woods! 

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We walked 95% to school. By high school, occasionally take transit bus across the street.

My parents were quite safety conscious for us. They preferred if possible we went to school with a sibling. After school, often we were coming home ...solo...walking. So that was a problem In kindergarten, myself and sis were accompanied by an older girl, daughter of my father's boss.

lst 4 years for me, school was 1.5 km. away.  So my parents did worry. Lots of safety lectures at home. You have to understand during lst wk. of kindergarten boys were yelling racist names at me and throwing stones. I had nightmares for lst few months. I was walking solo home. Finally a classmate girl  (she was white) told them to stop. I think her witnessing, made them stop.   I have strong opinions about bullying and racism.   Which similar incidents resurfaced in high school...I think the other girl was also jealous of me.

I never told my parents. I knew it would worry them..

The benchmark for us, was to be home at particular time. And if we weren't, parents worried. Yes, the days of no cellphone.

So for middle school and high school, walking 1-1.5 km. one way. All seasons...even if very cold/snowy.  That was our "exercise" without my parents planning it. Couldn't afford cost of hobby/sports programs.

My father worked until 1:00 am in restaurant....so he was sleeping. Then he went to work at 3:00 pm.  So very little car chaperoning.

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Grade school was a 4 block walk. We moved to the country when I started Jr High. I rode the bus until I was 15. You can drive to school with a School Permit at 14 in Nebraska if you have a rural residence and live more than 3 miles from school. 
We drove our kids to school until our oldest was 9 or 10. They had a group of friends that all walked together. When we moved to our current neighborhood, our son walked to school abou the same distance as the old walk. Our daughter’s high school was about 3 miles away but only a few blocks from WoW’s work so she would driver her there. After daughter turned 16, she became school bus for our kids. This city does several things well but public and school transit is a major weakness 

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Grew up in a rough hood, drive by shootings etc. Mostly white and black population. We were 1 of only 4 Hispanic families on the block. We walked home a block since we were 5 years old. I had some white kid try to hit me with a stick. I grabbed it away then gave him a beat down with it, 4th grade. 6 grade walking through the field on the way home, a few blacks playing with a football. Ball came to me so I picked it up to throw it back to the guy furthest away. The flag football hero said throw it to him but I threw it to the other guy. He got mad and said he was going to kick my ass. :o

OK, Mr. Flag football. I was playing full contact football for years at that point and though the flags were for sissies. So I was surrounded by a circle of black kids, about 10. Thought I was going to get jumped by all of them. But they stood around saying ,Get him Perry!", the kids name. He took a step towards me and my left hand went up out of instinct and punched him in the face. :party: I heard the crowd saying, "you're going to get it now!" but the flag football star backed down and I was able to leave without further incident.

But things got rougher in middle school. Kids were already stabbing one another and fist fighting with teachers. :default_sissy-fight-smiley:

My older brother was always afraid of others so living in a rough area, my Dad being afraid for my brother and worried I'd be a fighter, shipped us out to a private school 20 miles away. I hated having to drive that far for 4 years of HS. :angry:

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2 minutes ago, Allen said:

I got my first car because I went to boarding school. It was three hundred miles from home. By Christmas break they were done with making the drive and Pop bought a new car and I was gifted his old one. I think the only time they returned to campus after that was graduation day. 

I can’t even imagine boarding school. What was the reason you went there?

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17 minutes ago, Longjohn said:

I can’t even imagine boarding school. What was the reason you went there?

It was my idea. I was a bit beyond the local schools. For a while I went to school in Athens (30 miles away). They had a bus service but it was 2 hours each way with all the stops. 4 hours a day on a bus wore me down, and schools in my county were not a good fit.  Figured I was either going to be stuck with a miserable commute or boarding school. So boarding school it was, and it turned out to be a good choice. 

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Through grade 8, i had a block walk - half a block to the corner and then half a block to the school entrance.  I walked to high school most of the time, although I could take a city bus part of the way but it was usually more bother than it was worth.  it was just about a mile each way.

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Another comfort for parents, when walking anywhere far between school and home, or home and library (which was 1/2 mile in totally different direction), was if any of us was with a good friend that they knew. So they tolerated huge long talks amongst teenagers outside of home.

They preferred to meet at least once, any of our closest friends. 

We had a strict upbringing....we weren't even allowed to go over to friend's home for sleepovers, etc.

Did we suffer....well, we were rarely driven everywhere by my parent (father) ..we still had freedom, kept good best friend relationships, and was unsupervised in other ways. Under such circumstances, it is important a child/teen develop/maintain positive close friendships, outside of the family.

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4 minutes ago, Thaddeus Kosciuszko said:

So, are the police still looking for you?

Not for what I did in 1962.

Over the years... I've had a LOT more time to do stupid stuff.  They could be looking.

Twice... the got the wrong guy.  

Once... I was late for a meeting 60 miles from home.   I had an old Chey Citation with a V6.  I was on I-80, and  I had the speedometer pegged at 85, I'm not sure how fast I was going.   I noticed a car way down the road in the middle between the lanes,  I assumed it taking radar.   I slowed way down.   Some guy in a yellow Camaro passes me and he gets pulled over.  So I put the pedal back to the metal....  

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Why do I have this urge to wax on about walking 5 miles to school, trodding through the snow and howling wind during the winter, and spring with the new crop as leaving the farm would hoe one row and the end of the day when I returned would pick the hoe up, the same to the next row as I worked my way back to the house. Kids today just...

OK, went to a Catholic school for the first 8 years in Jacksonville, so there was no snow. First two years lived 5 blocks away and walked. Then moved further out. Would walk a half mile, cross a busy highway and catch a city bus. I was right at the dividing line where next stop was two tokens. While there was no snow, do remember one year had a sleet storm and that older bridge you see from the football stadium (newer bridge next to it hadn't been built yet.) When it iced over, there was no equipment to salt or clear it and too steep for cars to cross. Re-routed everyone to the three downtown bridges and back up traffic. The bus I caught normal circuit was downtown to the beach, wasn't my normal bus, but the first one from hours earlier finally making the return trip from the beach.

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59 minutes ago, Tizeye said:

Why do I have this urge to wax on about walking 5 miles to school, trodding through the snow and howling wind during the winter, and spring with the new crop as leaving the farm would hoe one row and the end of the day when I returned would pick the hoe up, the same to the next row as I worked my way back to the house. Kids today just...

Before I returned to cycling @31 yrs.  (thx to my dearie..), I walked alot.

I walked nearly 7 kms. round trip to university from home with knapsack of 2-3 heavy 400pg. hardcover or softcover books in late 1970's, wearing long heavy wool winter coat. ..through snow and ice. E-books had not arrived.  The Internet was still sequestered in some lab for  only certain graduate students .... (I attended a special lecture @ University of Waterloo (where I studied first 2 yrs.) on experimental searchable, electronic version of Oxford English dictionary...the 12-volume full set on etymology of English words that English academics use...and there was excitement at that time...)

This is not to show that today's kids are soft, but how possible it is just to have an active lifestyle without even realizing you are exercising. 

After all this.... why cycle commuting for me, for many years as an adult especially through parks system....it is child-like freedom to de-stress.  

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