this post was submitted on 09 Nov 2023
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I remember when kids made their own way to school. Most rode, some caught busses or walked. Very few were dropped off.
I think of this often, as my kids either ride or catch the bus and this is considered weird today. When I was a kid, there were hundreds of bikes in the racks. Today, there might be 20, usually fewer. Maybe a dozen kids are on the bus. But try and get a car near the school and you'll be in a queue. They all get dropped off/picked up these days.
Yeah I used to walk every day! Primary and high school.
Me too
Can confirm this. During primary school we walked or rode our bikes (4 sibs). Getting dropped off in a car meant you had a broken leg/foot. Secondary school I was at a boarding school. On weekends we'd pick up a sandwich lunch from the school kitchen and get on our bikes and go for a long ride. Had to be back by sunset for rollcall. No supervision. The miracle was that we didn't get in trouble - not even close. Couldn't do that nowadays - the school authorities would be screaming and so would the parents. We'd also take one of the school dinghies and go fishing all day - the kitchen took the loot and served it up for breakfast the next day.
The need to supervise children every waking minute of their lives has reached fairly absurd proportions. I while ago I was reading about a "walking school bus" program designed to get kids walking to school instead of being driven. It was facing closure because of lack of funding. The idea that walking to school is something that needs both a special program and funding is just wrong in so many ways.
I don't know how we managed to get from children being able to run around mostly unsupervised to a society in which people will call 000 because they see a teenager sitting in a car without an adult, but we have.
It boggles the mind. My parents were pretty tight, and I still walked multi km to the trainstation. What they would’ve been like with the tracking and helicopter options available now is terrifying.
I was dropped off in the morning, but would either catch the bus or walk home. Mostly I walked, as spending money on lollies on the way home seemed a better option than spending it on bus fare.
That was in the days you could choose your lollies individually - prices at that time ranged from 2 for one cent for things like chocolate freckles up to 2c a lollie for some fancy things. Or you could just let them choose by ordering mixed lollies - 20c of mixed lollies was a pretty standard amount.
Fag lolly cigarettes. Tasted like nothing but you played at being sophisticated waving them around