"Where Are All The Kids?"

I asked myself that question when I was driving thru our neighborhood on a recent summer day.  The weather was way too nice for them to be inside.  Where are they?

I know that, today, so many Moms have to work.  Not for frivolous things, not for personal fulfillment, but just to make ends meet.  And that makes me sad.

I, along with most of the kids I grew up with in the 50's and 60's, had stay-at-home Moms...and I always felt very blessed.  Sure, we had some pre-women's lib "pioneers", but for the most part, our Moms were home all day.  And that made for a terrific childhood!

Life was a lot simpler then.  Dads went to work, the kids did their chores and then were outside most of the day.  Most of the homes in our neighborhood had two, three or more kids, per house...  a lively neighborhood, for sure!  Knocking on doors was reserved for grown ups... An "Oh, Nancy" or an "Oh, Debbie" was all it took to summon someone to play.

There were kickball games to be played, lemonade stands to be tended, doll carriages to be pushed with our neighbor friends, bikes to be ridden...  Oh, it wasn't always utopia though - we were kids, after all.  Sometimes, disagreements would break out and the lines would be drawn.  But the 3 kids who weren't getting along with 3 other kids one day would eventually make up and the next tussle might have a totally different group of kids siding with former "enemies" against their former "friends". We were kids and we worked it out.

It seems that there was always something to do in our neighborhood.  If it was just sitting around, talking about what we were going to do the next day, we were outside.  Later in the day, we would be interrupted by the whistle of the  nearby automobile factory, signaling the end of the workday.  That meant the Dads would return home, supper would be eaten, and the kids would be back out for more fun.  Playing dodge ball, Spud, jump rope, catching lightening bugs...then the street lights would come on...the universal signal that it was time to say "so long" and head for home.  But we knew that tomorrow would offer more of the same....neighborhood kids, good times.

Back then, everyone knew their neighbors.  And looked out for one another.  If you were getting into something that wasn't approved of, it wasn't unheard of to get a correction from a neighbor kid's Mom.  And that was okay.

Now, I'm not saying that today's home lives and neighborhoods aren't terrific... It's just different now.  But I feel so fortunate that I grew up when I did.  I'm sure this all sounds very "corny" to those who didn't.  Kids today are so advanced, compared to the goofy kids that I called "friends".  But I wouldn't trade those years, those friends, those times, those memories, for anything in the world.