Him: "Hey, you know that bar that used to be right on the curve as you went into town? Is that still there?"
Her: "You know, I can remember my Dad taking me and my brother in there so he could have a beer on the way home from hunting."
You know, normal stuff.
It led us to think about what things our parents did that seemed fine at the time, but just wouldn't fly today..
Her Take:
As a child, I was almost, but not entirely, feral.
I’m sure my folks wouldn’t love me saying that, but I think we can all agree they’re not reading this. (Unless one of you rats me out…) Don’t get me wrong, my parents did everything they could reasonably do. They worked hard, took good care of my brother and me, and, occasionally, they just needed us to not be in the house.
So, we went outside. I remember being vaguely dirty almost all of the time starting at the age of seven because I was just out there, somewhere in the cul de sac with other kids, playing in the dirt, riding bikes, designing a tree fort (that we never built), just generally doing dirty things for hours. There was always a little bit of dirt under my fingernails, I was always a little sweaty, and I assume I smelled funky.
You’ve heard this tune before, right? We had to be home for meals, but then we left again, to wander in the woods or whatever we were doing, it didn’t matter, as long as we were home by dark.
I can still smell the smoke from my Mom’s Virginia Slim as I ran in through the garage door at the end of the day and ran right up to change out of my play clothes into my pajamas so I could go to bed and do it all over again.
It was not so by the time my kids came around.
We had a mostly fenced in yard they could play in, and they did go outside, but the idea of letting them roam free the way my brother and I did seemed absolutely absurd. I can pretend that it was because we lived ‘in town’ instead of ‘out of town’ like I did when I was a kid, that it was just more dangerous because there was traffic. But, there was a county highway 2 blocks from my childhood home so the argument kind of falls apart, right?
The honest truth is, the world changed in the 15 or so years since I had been a kid wandering loose in it. And it’s not just that we didn’t really know our neighbors anymore, although we didn’t. It felt like there was so much wrong outside that I couldn’t see my way clear to trust those precious little humans to wander too far.
They could play in the yard, but they had to stay where I could see them. No leaving the yard, no crossing the street, no riding bikes wherever they wanted to go.
I still remember the feeling the first time one of them, probably my daughter, wanted to ride bikes just three blocks to play on the playground. I wanted to say no, I really did. In fact, maybe the first time I did say no. Eventually I had to give in, though, and they left. I stood on the porch listening to the sound of their bikes until I couldn’t hear it anymore then went back inside and started to worry. After probably no more than 30 anxiety-cleaning-heart-pounding-miserable minutes they came back, perfectly fine, and I was so relieved that I almost cried.
Maybe that sounds like a little much, right? I’ll admit to being hyper-vigilant with my kids, and this was probably just another example of me needing to know what was happening with every precious little cell of their bodies every second of every day, but somehow it still felt right.
Yes, I wonder what it would have been like for my kids to have the times I had as a kid, how it would have made them different people, and I worry that I’ve made a mistake being so over cautious.
The world had changed. It felt dangerous beyond what I could even understand, and I felt like I would be the only thing that protected them.
His Take:
I’m constantly learning of more and more differences between people that live in and around the city of Chicago and people from Wisconsin Rapids. One major difference that I just don’t understand is the relationships that people have with their relatives. Back home, people keep up with their family. What’s going on, who they’re dating, what’s going on at their jobs, ect. Here? Not so much. A guy I used to work with would only talk to his mother on monther’s day, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. Maybe one other time, but that’s pushing it. I never got that. How can you just not communicate with your mother on at least a semi-regular basis? I mean, she gave you your LIFE. The least you could freaking do is take her out to lunch once a month.
It must be tough being a parent. Having someone that you love unconditionally and adore, and they don’t appreciate you at all. Stopping by for an hour on Christmas or whatever is bullshit, and should never be done. Maybe that’s just me. I have a great relationship with my mom and dad. Now, full disclosure here, I am not a parent. Well, that’s not 100% true, but that’s a story that one day I’d like to tell, just to get it off my chest. So, unless I see a child being abused, I don’t ever tell people how they should raise their kids. But when Sue suggested this topic, there were some things that immediately came to mind.
First, right off the bat, I never knew my real dad. The short version of the story is this: It’s late 1972 and my mom has “relations” with a gentleman (we can just call him a huge piece of shit). She has just turned 22 and when she found out she was pregnant, she was pretty scared. She didn’t want him to have any legal claim to me, so on my birth certificate, my father is listed as “unknown”, I always thought that was awesome because when I was growing up, I always thought that my dad could be Han Solo or Indiana Jones, or even Batman. Later, I found out that he was the exact opposite of all those men. Anyway, today, that whole situation would go down pretty different. But, I had a young mom, it was the 70’s, you couldn’t Google “should I put a guys name on my kids birth certificate? “I really hold no ill will to my mom for doing that. I can totally understand her thinking, and put in the same position, I would’ve done exactly what she did. But again, today? Things probably wouldn’t go that way.
The second thing I want to talk about is awesome and I’m convinced it made me into the electrifying man that I am today. So, like I mentioned before, I had a young mother. We lived with my grandparents and my great grandma in a nice house in Keller, Like any young person, my mom liked to go out with her girlfriends. She would go out on Saturday nights, and I would stay at home with my grandparents. Until my grandparents went out of town. So, instead of not going out, my mom did the logical thing……she took me with her. So there’s 5/6 year old me, dancing the night away (WAY past my bedtime) at a disco. And of course, ALL the girls thought it was so cute that the little boy was there and could kind of dance, so they always paid special attention to me. I’m totally convinced that that’s where my love of blonds came from. Again, today you’d probably get kicked out of the club and publicly shamed for bringing a child with you. For me, it was totally groovy.
The final one that I’ll touch on quickly is that when we lived in Los Angeles, during the summer when I didn’t have school, I would walk about a mile from our apartment to my mom’s office, have lunch with her and then I’d either stay at the office with her until she was done, or I could walk back home and play. It was 1984 or 1985, and nobody thought anything of it for a 12-year-old to walk through downtown LA by himself. Yeah, if that happened today, I’m pretty sure my mom would’ve been in jail.
It sounds like I’m picking on my mom, and that couldn’t be further from the truth. If I could have chosen my mother, it would’ve been her, hands down. She did a fantastic job raising me. I always had plenty of food, nice clothes, and toys and comic books. She taught me many important life lessons that I still use today and I thank her for that. Sure, she must’ve made an occasional mistake, but what parent doesn’t? And I’m guessing that when it’s your first child, there’s a lot more stress than say, when you have baby number 3 or 4. So yes, please don’t follow some of the examples of my mom’s parenting, in today’s world, they would land her in hot water. But hey, at least there was a ridiculous amount of love in my life. And I can totally dig it.
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