alt Hacker NewsI was 10 in '72, in a big metropolis. I'd take off on my Stingray bike on all day jaunts all over. The only comments I got were from my mom who made sure I had change to phone home in case I got a flat. I started a 4am paper route on that bike two years later, nobody batted an eye. It was the best of times.
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It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.
I was in elementary school when the arcade game craze happened, PacMan, Donkey Kong, etc. I would wander the streets looking for games to play. There were arcade games in every grocery store, restaurants, every convenience store (so basically just 7-11s). Home gaming consoles could not begin to match what was in the arcades at that time. I would walk the streets looking for new ones to play.
I mostly played arcade games, but I would play pinball too. One day I was walking past a place and saw a pinball game and went in and started playing. I think it was on the second quarter when someone came and asked if I was there with my parents. I said no and they told me I had to leave since minors weren't allowed in a bar. I don't think I even know what a bar was at that time.
Elementary school kid hanging out in a bar without his parents would get some CPS attention these days I guess.
The worst of times part is, if I was "free range" it wasn't because my parents had discussed the risks and benefits of allowing me to wander the streets. No kid I knew had both parents at home back then. Our moms worked. We were free range because no one gave a shit what we did as long as we weren't causing them some immediate problem. So we had freedom. It was both glorious and horrible.
Yeah. I did the same when I was aged 8-12 in the early 1990's. I'd bike or walk everywhere, go into all kinds of stores and the library, and get into all kinds of minor trouble with the neighborhood kids. I'm very sad that my kids aren't able to have that kind of a life (even though I get that it's largely my own fault, because we live in an area where that is just not possible).