What Girls Do For Fun These Days

This is Whitley's friend Marika

Here's Whitley

And the two photo- journalist-editor-publishers!!!

When I played alone as a girl, I played with Barbies. When I played inside, with other kids, we played house, school, store and board games. In the winter, our outside games consisted of building three room snow forts, snowball fights and even setting up someones discarded tree after Christmas and re-decorating it with items we found lying around. In the summer, we played hide and seek, started a game of baseball, pitcher and catcher if there was just two of us, rode bikes, had foot races, fished, swam in the strip mines or a creek and the list could on and on. We were gone from early morning, popped in for lunch when the noon whistle blew and home before dark. We combed every inch of our little midwestern town and somehow managed to live and circumvent serious injuries. Sure, I crashed into a 50 year old oak tree learning to ride my bike, got zapped by an electric fence, thrown from a horse and rolled a 4-wheeler, one incident of which I got grounded for. And yes, there were scraped knees too many times to count, bruises from who knows where, rusty nails in the feet and a splinter to be pulled from my finger...but somehow, I survived. And you know what? It was great fun....some of the best memories I have today.

But today, the parks are empty and if they are attended, an adult is present. Nobody walks home from school, especially at age 6! Your Dad is vacationing with his other kids, your mom is on a business trip and your teacher has suspended you for telling a boy he looks like Zac Efferon. Now, go to your room, and do your homework, before you really get it!

In other places, like LA, kids sleep in bath tubs to avoid stray bullets flying from gang crossfire. But the actual threat to kids is perhaps less important than the perception of danger. There were almost 36 million American children between the ages of 5 and 14 in the US in 1991, and only 519 of them were murdered. The mortality rate has dropped steadily for decades since we started immunizing to less than 50% of the 1950 figures. This is because influenza killed more children than all the child predators and drive by shooting in history. However, the fear of crime is almost a separate phenomenon from the real danger it poses. Today, fear is to be feared.

It subtle, but it's there. Architecture, for example, used to have porches on the front. Houses orientated themselves to community and kids playing in the streets. Today, we have privacy fences and back patio with yards where kids play alone or with a friend whose mother may drive them over. More glaring signs are are security systems, some on your house and some on your kids! Video cameras, NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH signs, kids texting on cells to their parents to let them know they are okay.

No one can blame parents for being protective of their children or wanting to keep them safe, but I never thought I, or we, would be this hyperprotective. Disease still kills more kids than stalkers.

Of course there are the Polly Klaas's, the Jon Benet's. But why is this only in America? Why do kids stil run up and doen the market street of Panama? And walk home at 7 from school in Canada? Who killed the innocent age of childhood in America?

Perhaps, we all did.

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The above statements above are revised from some work I've done in my Human Growth and Development class. I am touched by the importance of childhood play and am determined to start taking a few more risks in life with my child to see that she is able to make the memories I had and learn the "street smart" skills that comes with a few bumps and spills.

Whitley had a great weekend. It snowed again, about 7 inches here at the house. She had a blast playing in the snow! She also had a friend over this weekend and they used my digital camera palying "modeling" and running a "magazine" all weekend. They took their pictures and then went to the phot editor on the computer and really added some sophisticated touches to their work. I noticed their pictures captured lots of emotion and feelings that they felt kids could relate to. They even had a section in their magazine that dealt with "Depression". Hmmmm. I was really proud of their diverse work, their resourcefulness and their creativity. It's interesting to see them use the tools and electronic toys of today, to play!

Enjoy and once in awhile, even if you're 50.....GO PLAY!!!!!