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What part of your childhood do you wish your kids could experience, but they won’t? (1 Viewer)

The impact, loud THUNK! and the accompanied ear ringing resulting from getting hit in the head by a real dodge ball you didn't see coming.

It was a gift I gave each of my kids on their 10th birthday. 

 
OrtonToOlsen said:
I dunno, guys.

A lot of this stuff is nostalgic but wasn’t that great.

Us: When we were kids didn’t just play vidiya games we made things with Legos!

Our parents: Legos?  We had splintery wooden blocks and we liked it.

Our grandparents:  Splintery? Our blocks were made of asbestos and covered in lead paint!

Our great-grandparents: Play? We worked in the mills and the mines and the only toys we had were polio crutches and small pox scabs!
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Well when you put it that way kids today got it made.

 
Another mention of riding bikes everywhere.  We had a large empty field and woods nearby with bike trails etc.  Would spend weeks/months building forts.  One summer we actually got some shovels and dug a underground fort that was 10 x 6 and 4 feet deep.  We cut down some full size trees (1 foot diameter) and cut them into sections to lay over the hole (even with ground level) and then covered it with dirt and leaves.  We had a piece of plywood covering the entrance.  When we finished, you could not find it unless you knew it was there.  Had candles to light up inside and we'd hang out in there looking playboys/penthouse we could get our hands on.  Man that was awesome.  Spring came the next year and the damn thing had 2 feet of water in it.  That was a sad day. 

Hanging out at the convenient store buying candy.  Gum cigarettes that would puff out smoke. Playing the arcade games they would change out every so often.  Pengo, Zaxxon, Dig Dug, Donkey Kong Jr, Ms Pacman.

We would play a game of tag on bikes with teams.  The team searching would have tennis balls and would chase down the other players.  Hitting them with a ball was getting caught.  We played in a section of 4 streets with a apartment complex, corner store, gas station and neighborhood streets.  What fun.

Kick the can on weekends mostly at my house late into the night.  I can still hear my dad complaining on how we used to wreck his lawn sliding in home base.

 
Doug B said:
Can't speak for every parent everywhere, and I know this kind of thing varies a ton from town to town and region to region. But:

My wife is convinced that kids out playing just get snatched up all the time. She is convinced that the odds of any one kids getting kidnapped if not supervised by an adult is something like one in three. Accordingly, my kids never got the experience of walking around to other kids houses and playing. Playing out in the street with neighbor kids. None of that.

Pretty much every kid we know and every other set of parents we know feel the same way. Yeah, they could go out and play ... but, you know, they'd get kidnapped. Every time, practically.

Play dates used to be for toddlers too young to walk or bike to friends' houses. These days, play dates or supervised hangouts pretty much go on into high school.

It's sad to me. And that kind of independence is something kids really need -- and I dare say that the true odds of abduction (1 in a zillion) are pretty much worth it. My wife and I don't like our kids retreating to their screens and chats and social media and online games and all ... but what choice were they left with? They're reaching out for some peer-to-peer contact anyway they can get it. We grew up taking that for granted, and then denied it to our own children.
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Assuming you could get your wife to buy in, what would happen if you let your kids bike to their friends' houses? Neighbors call CPS? Another alternative is you and your wife taking them out to do something active, participating with them or as a chaperone with their friends.

 
Jayrod said:
I recently went a few rounds with my wife over letting my 12 year old son walk 2 blocks from the Jr. High where he was lifting weights to the school he was still attending that my wife teaches at.

Literally 2 blocks at 7:30 am in suburbia.  Her primary argument was that he was the only one in the building that had to do it and the other kids' parents all picked them up and drove them.  Out of 5 possible days, he only ended up walking twice.  The other 3 times either she came to get him or her mother did.

It still pisses me off a bit that she was so hysterical about it.
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Yep, and we wonder why obesity is an epidemic And the other consequence of this type of neuroticism is increasing traffic.

 
Brony said:
Playing a sport just because it's fun.  Not at a set time organized by parents who are constantly reprimanding and correcting every move you make. 
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good one. I used to get together with my friends and play baseball in the park. real hardball, no helmets, no umps, no parents. we were all on little league teams, but had way more fun just playing on our own. sure you might take a fastball to the noggin, but that just meant you needed better reflexes.

I'm sure it still happens, but probably much less frequently because of helicopter parents.

 
As a clueless non-parent, it really makes all this stuff even more baffling. I work with a lot of parents. I never raised kids so the difference seems really stark to me (my only childhood experience to draw on is still my own). When they mention the stuff they won't let their kids do, I can't help but ask what they were doing at that age. That's generally met with a look of horror. 

From an outsiders perspective, these kids seem very physically safe, but an awful lot of them hit age 25 without an ounce of independence. Not their fault. From my very limited anecdotal experience with parents, it's the parents that really don't want the kids to ever grow up. 

 
Herb said:
There used to be nothing quite as exhilarating as listening to the radio for hours just to hear that great new song.  Then if you were on the ball you could hit record on your tape deck and voila! free music. 

Also "gun fights" with toy guns that looked ridiculously real. My 10 year old friends and I would have gotten shot by police today.

And what @mr robotosaid, as we actually grew up in the same small town, a few years apart. Unfortunately for him, he was probably too young to go sliding down the dam at the lake that's no longer there and get yelled at by his parents for wrecking yet another pair of perfectly good jeans.
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No. I remember the dam before it broke. Slippery. 

 
rick6668 said:
Another mention of riding bikes everywhere. 
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My two kids are back into Pokemon Go, so they're out and about doing that (one is driving, but at least it's outside).

Mine has to do with living overseas.  My dad had a job that allowed him to transfer out (Ecuador).  We lived there two years.  Getting to learn another language and culture still sticks with me.  Sadly my job has no ability to get posted anywhere but here, so my kids will never get that.

 
Drive in movies.

My uncle owned half a dozen of them, so we got in free and went all the time.

Parents took us to ever Disney movie, but I also remember seeing for the first time Caddyshack and Back to the Future at the drive in. Back to the Future was a double feature with The Last Starfighter with a TON of family and friends (who also got in free with us). We were setup like a campground with lawchairs and everything. It was AWESOME!!!

 
Politician Spock said:
Drive in movies.

My uncle owned half a dozen of them, so we got in free and went all the time.

Parents took us to ever Disney movie, but I also remember seeing for the first time Caddyshack and Back to the Future at the drive in. Back to the Future was a double feature with The Last Starfighter with a TON of family and friends (who also got in free with us). We were setup like a campground with lawchairs and everything. It was AWESOME!!!
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Was also cool that your parents would give you money and let you go to the concession stand by yourself 

 
Actually I wish my daughters could have grown up with a little more privacy to their lives. Social media caused them so much drama in HS and college due to the fact that everybody knows everything you do. They go boating and post a picture and other friends are pissed..others go somewhere and post pictures and they are pissed. All the kids always feel like they are missing out on something.

I hung out with a group of 4-5 good buddies all the time.  When I went to a concert or out bar hopping with only 1 or 2 we never wanted the others to know so as not to hurt their feeling or cause a problem and nobody ever found out unless it slipped...me included if I did not go. Now everybody knows everything.

 
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 Few years ago i got a promotion/relocation that meant more money but an hour commute.  We talked about moving to a nicer area where we could afford a better house and shorten my commute. 

I grew up in a city where it was common to just scream a friends name and their head would pop out the window before they bolted downstairs to play.

We had been in this small, i guess blue collar suburb town planting our roots. Had a house for 5 years and liked the block and the friends we made in this small NJ town. When my relocation set in, we did decide to move but we bought the house behind us.

We got our bigger house and kept all the friends and community.

We're not helicopter parents but watchfull. As the kids got older...yea...playdates and stuff. Just very different from when i grew up. My wife would get a text from someone down the street for a quick meetup of kids.

My kids are 13/10 now...i recall maybe...4 years ago they really started to have block friends. I'm watching TV and there is a knock on the door. Im like wtf, i don't want to be bothered...I'm watching Seinfeld, maybe they don't notice me on the couch 3' away from the door???

Eh, i get up open the door and JJ (7) from accross the street. "Can Noah come out and play?"  I was so excited! I screamed for my son to get his sneakers and go outside....and it kinda started. 

I bought a wiffleball  bat and ball and would go play with my kids outside and a few kids would walk over and coyly watch us before i asked them to join.

Now it's not my 80's/90s level of kids outside from 8am-9pm playing wiffleball ball leagues, keeping stats, trading baseball cards with 15-20 kids...but it's happend. Kids knock on my door asking for my kids and it's awesome. I pull down my street from work and sometimes see my kids playing in the street and my son will come running over to me.

We recently started giving them a lot of freedoms. We have a town area where the baseball fields are. My kids want to go down there with their friends and hang to watch the LL game. Its about 1 mile away. We let them ride their bikes there or they get a ride with a parent.

They'll hang there with all their friends for a few few hours and then come home. Its pretty neat seeing my kid ride off on his bike, wearing his helmet and a backpack with some snacks, phone and wallet with 3 bucks....as he and his 3 man crew start riding off on their adventures. Last week my son (10) was invited to a block party in town.  He left at 10am...we did some stuff ended up the town pool and all i know i only saw him at 11pm...all bandaged up! He busted his ### on his bike....as he comes up to tell me..."look dad, i kilt my elbow" like a badge of honor.

We let them walk to school and back home with their friends...about a mile away. A few times they bike it.  My wife picked up a part time job where a couple days a week she is out the house at 530...and I at 545.

The kids are left to get up with their phone alarm, eat breakfast,  get dressed, brush their teeth and walk to school...they even have a key to the house, well i got a fancy keyless entry lock now.

So far so good. Even when my son tried to make chocolate coverd strawberries and burned the chocolate in the microwave and then tried to mask the odor with lysol spray and then pretends he doesn't know what i am talking about when i ask him about the horrible smell.

Not gonna lie. Some helicopterish anxiety with these freedoms. I worry about the boogieman a tiny bit, getting hit by a car or whatever other fears but i love seeing them get out. 

Don't get me wrong. Theyre not Joe vagabond over here..they still watch YouTube and snapchats 18 hours a day.

Its a small enough town (like 2sq miles) where everything is close enough by foot/bike and small enough (7000 pop) where people pretty much know and watch over each other.

Sorry, Im rambling now but i guess im saying im happy we stayed in our area.

There is hope....kids haven't changed, parents have....but we don't have to.

 
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Oh...baseball cards.

I loved collecting with my friends. Trading cards. Buying a pack and getting a Canseco Rookie!! The excitement on thumbing through the cards as you start to see the next card and realize you hit the child lottery when you start to see the "R" in rated rookie!

Now, kids need $50 bucks to buy 4 packs where each pack has 3 cards!

My kids could "experience" this still but the reality is, this hobby is now geared towards the adult collector.

 
-Trick or treating all night without parents 

-Summertime rules? Which means ... hey have some breakfast, get out of the house - don’t wanna see you until lunch. After lunch? Just make sure you’re home for dinner - after that? Make sure you’re home by sundown. (It was really amazing running around with that freedom)

- actually talking to people on the phone. “Hey is so n so there?” 

- building a fort

- defending that fort from the neighborhood kids that are not part of our crew 

- headlight tag 

- turning everything into fun, nonphones or internet. Just go make the fun. Climb a tree, burn some ants, make a wooden sword? Anything.

- trick or treating without parents (YES. That was my first suggestion. But it means sooooo much. Trick or treating with my then, 10-12 year old friends was the best time ever. Can’t do that now.)

so .... I think if/when I ever have kids? I would want them to fully experience trick or treating in a sweet ### neighborhood without parental supervision. Just have fun out there, kiddo 😎

 
Doug B said:
Can't speak for every parent everywhere, and I know this kind of thing varies a ton from town to town and region to region. But:

My wife is convinced that kids out playing just get snatched up all the time. She is convinced that the odds of any one kids getting kidnapped if not supervised by an adult is something like one in three. Accordingly, my kids never got the experience of walking around to other kids houses and playing. Playing out in the street with neighbor kids. None of that.

Pretty much every kid we know and every other set of parents we know feel the same way. Yeah, they could go out and play ... but, you know, they'd get kidnapped. Every time, practically.

Play dates used to be for toddlers too young to walk or bike to friends' houses. These days, play dates or supervised hangouts pretty much go on into high school.

It's sad to me. And that kind of independence is something kids really need -- and I dare say that the true odds of abduction (1 in a zillion) are pretty much worth it. My wife and I don't like our kids retreating to their screens and chats and social media and online games and all ... but what choice were they left with? They're reaching out for some peer-to-peer contact anyway they can get it. We grew up taking that for granted, and then denied it to our own children.
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What's with you guys?  Sorry, but take a stance and a have a say on what your kids can do.  I grew up in my neighborhood where we were out all the time. My wife didn't, she grew up in a rural area where it was just her and her brother.  

When it comes to "playing outside" rules, I'm very vocal.  

 
  • Smile
Reactions: Ned
Zow said:
Sure. And millennials have bad work ethics, kids lack respect, nobody understands the value of the dollar, and American values are in the toilet. 
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Lol I said none of that.  Raising kids is different nowadays it just is.

 
OrtonToOlsen said:
I dunno, guys.

A lot of this stuff is nostalgic but wasn’t that great.

Us: When we were kids didn’t just play vidiya games we made things with Legos!
Click to expand...
I do think most people have selective memory about their childhoods.  While we spent a lot of time outdoors playing pick-up sports, riding bikes, etc., we also spent a crapload of time inside playing Atari, watching MTV, and looking at porn mags.

 
Politician Spock said:
Drive in movies.

My uncle owned half a dozen of them, so we got in free and went all the time.

Parents took us to ever Disney movie, but I also remember seeing for the first time Caddyshack and Back to the Future at the drive in. Back to the Future was a double feature with The Last Starfighter with a TON of family and friends (who also got in free with us). We were setup like a campground with lawchairs and everything. It was AWESOME!!!
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I had to sneak my way in hiding in the trunk.  Felt like a mob hit with me eventually digging my own grave.

 
comfortably numb said:
Oh...baseball cards.
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This is a big one for me.  I tried to get my kids into it.  No such luck, because their friends aren't into it.

 
It comes full circle...lol

My daughter (13) walked home from softball practice with her friend. They are asking for a huge favor....drive them to Five below. They want to shop. So we're here. My daughter and her friend are running around filling a basket of junk.

I ask if my daughter has money, she says she has 18 dollars. I ask her friend charlie if she has any money...Ava is gonna lend me money..lol

I walk around and see an assortment of baseball cards...with jose canseco on the front of one of the bundles. I didn't buy it...it was the 88 donruss. Yuck!!

Anyhow,  they have a basket of junk and are now sorting to the 4 or 7 items of perfume, fake nails, scrunchy buns and gummy bears they reallllly want for their 18 dollars.

Its the last day of school. I'll surprise them and pay for everything at the register. 

20 years from now they'll be telling people how their kids will never experience shopping at 5 below on a weeknight for junk crap?

 
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I grew up with my parents owning a bookstore in southern NJ. For about 7 years we had a second store in Stone Harbor, NJ. during my teens. Great summers as a teen hanging in a shore town. 

As people stated above, hanging outside with 10 other kids until dark is another one. We live in the country with no kids really in the neighborhood. Even if there were, it wouldn't matter. Too many distractions inside.

I wonder what a good benchmark for this trend would be? Bicycle sales? 

 
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comfortably numb said:
Oh...baseball cards.

I loved collecting with my friends. Trading cards. Buying a pack and getting a Canseco Rookie!! The excitement on thumbing through the cards as you start to see the next card and realize you hit the child lottery when you start to see the "R" in rated rookie!

Now, kids need $50 bucks to buy 4 packs where each pack has 3 cards!

My kids could "experience" this still but the reality is, this hobby is now geared towards the adult collector.
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Yep--as a huge collector still, I have to pause at what I buy due to the costs. The companies try and produce lower end products for kids, but with the odd of 1--10000000 of getting an insert of some type, most kids are not interested in buying it.

I miss fireworks. Every year in my youth, we bought tons of dumb and dangerous stuff and had fun. Now, they are beyond illegal, but worse yet, my adult mind has hooked in and I am worried about fires and liability.

I wish social media didn't exist--the drama my teenage daughters have subjected themselves to is insane. 

 
shuke said:
Why not?  My kids do it all the time.
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Same.  We're lucky that our next door neighbors have kids the same ages as mine and they have the same mentality that we do.   Having phones come in handy as I can tell them to text me when they get to certain spots in the case they're biking a couple miles away.

The thing that stinks nowadays is b/c of the damn tick epidemic, I hardly let my kids go into the woods while I lived in them as a kid.    

 
shuke said:
This is a big one for me.  I tried to get my kids into it.  No such luck, because their friends aren't into it.
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Lol

 I tried it as well and started buying some topps cards to make a set with my kids and even put them in a binder and then I had a stack of doubles and I hand them to my daughter and said take these to school and ask if anyone has any of these types of cards and try to trade with them the cards you need to fill your set. She gave me the weirdest look....like, are you crazy?  There is no way I'm going to school with 37 baseball cards asking my friends if they wanna trade.

 
Zow said:
Sure. And millennials have bad work ethics, kids lack respect, nobody understands the value of the dollar, and American values are in the toilet. 
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Shut up and get off my lawn.

 
comfortably numb said:
Going to a baseball game taking 46 all star voting cards and punching in your favorite players at your seat.

Now kids can vote 8million times while taking a dump and having never watched a baseball game in their lives.
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So true.  I still have a couple hundred ballots from 1987 or 1988 I brought home from an Atlanta Braves game and never punched out.

 
May have been said, but spending countless hours in record stores. While vinyl has made a comeback, it’s just a limited, weak money grab centered around Barnes & Noble.

Also on the music front I’ll add learning all music info from rock mags like Circus and Creem. Yeah, Rolling Stone is still around, but not as music driven anymore.

 
zamboni said:
May have been said, but spending countless hours in record stores. While vinyl has made a comeback, it’s just a limited, weak money grab centered around Barnes & Noble.

Also on the music front I’ll add learning all music info from rock mags like Circus and Creem. Yeah, Rolling Stone is still around, but not as music driven anymore.
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The Circus readers polls were money. Waited all year for those! Pretty sure I still have a few of those old Circus, Hit Parader and Metal Edge mags in a box somewhere. 

I remember looking through the punk/hardcore section at the record store years before I got into the genre because the covers and song titles were so F'd up. Old Black Flag albums were practically pornographic in my 12 year old mind. And the Dead Kennedys! How scandalous!

 
Nigel said:
Always kind of pissed me off that my kids could run around playing freely outside without worry of stepping in dog ####. 
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I’m still laughing at this one because I now have the distinct visual of my brother stepping in dog #### barefoot.  Thank you for bringing that memory back to me.

 
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