Photo by William J. 'Bill' McCalpin
On Sunday, a guest column appeared in The Dallas Morning News written by an Austin-based mother bemoaning that she had been called to task for letting her child play outside. Here is a counterpoint to that article, written on this subject with all the seriousness her misdemeanor deserves …
I don’t know about you, but I spent Sunday afternoon in my Richardson neighborhood watching felonies take place outside my living room windows. Yes, right out there in the street in front of my home, about 5 p.m. on an overcast, early fall day in late September, in front of God and everyone, children were riding their bikes alone and in small groups – without adult supervision.
And these are hardly the only children who are in peril in our neighborhood. We live on two creeks — one along the back of the lot and the other that runs the length of one side. The two creeks meet in the back of our oversized lot, where there is an untamed area full of trees and brush where wild animals lurk to fight and hunt and howl in the dark.
Across the side creek, there is a stand of bamboo. All summer long, neighborhood children come down to play in the bamboo thicket, out of the sight of any adult supervision. Down in the thicket, they are exposed daily to the threat of poison ivy and stinging insects.
Other children swing on a rope that an irresponsible neighbor tied 20 feet in the air on a tree branch in the back of his lot so that the kids can swing across the back creek from his side to our side. A fall would land them in a foot of water; no, not clean city water but the water that has fallen on the streets and run down the gutters and into the storm sewers. Yes, sewers. The water in the creek is undoubtedly full of germs and insects and wild animals doing their business in the water.
And still other children — innocent pre-teen girls whose families live around us — yell unashamedly across the creek to check to see where their friends are. When they find each other, one girl has the temerity to tell her friend to come across the creek to her house. Yes, crossing the creek with its few inches of water, crawling with minnows and crawfish and rocks and algae and the occasional spot of mud. Why, if a girl fell, she would be in water up to her ankle, trapped in the wild at least 100 feet from her back door.
Even as I write about these horrible events in the evening’s twilight, a 7- or 8-year-old boy scoots by alone on his skateboard, riding in the street where, no doubt, at any moment, a crazed motorist will go out of his way to send the child to the ER or worse. Or what about the young pre-teen blond girl who often rides her bike alone in front of our house? Why, one day, when there was a loose dog in the neighborhood and the dog’s owner was frantically trying to catch it, I and this young girl corralled the dog and handed it back. This young girl could have been mauled by that 10-pound wet mop of fur! Worse, she spoke to me, a complete stranger, a total contravention of any safety rule, and came into my front yard to help catch the dangerous animal. Has she never heard of the creepy Boo Radley and the threat he presents?
Oh, no, of course not: To Kill a Mockingbird has been banned from her school curriculum. Well, perhaps her teachers can tell her about the dangers of strangers next door without exposing the children to that filthy, trashy novel full of racial slurs, profanity, and dialogue about rape.
Our neighborhood is full of dangers: foxes and coyotes and bobcats, owls and hawks and snakes, wasps and bees and hornets. Our neighborhood has poison ivy and vines with thorns and bois d’arc trees that can put a sharp point right through your hand. Worst of all, our neighborhood is full of pedestrians, walking on the sidewalks and jogging down the streets. These adults are often total strangers, living two or even three blocks away, yet they are permitted to run wild in and among the groups of children who have been allowed outside by their irresponsible parents.
And cancer, what about cancer? Children who are outside are exposed to the sun. Even in this neighborhood with many large trees overhanging the sidewalks, children are bombarded with solar radiation, the least little bit of which is known to cause hideous skin cancer. Isn’t it far better for our children to get their vitamin D from mass-produced pills than from that dangerous orb in the sky?
This is not to mention the air that our children must breathe when out of doors. Yes, “fresh” air is surely a misnomer. How can we allow our children to run and play in the same air where cars emit noxious gases, fireplaces belch smoke and poisons, and in which birds and animals perform the most offensive bodily functions?
Why are there so many parents in this neighborhood who are so careless about their children’s safety? There are dangers everywhere the moment you step outside. It is surely far safer to keep your children indoors on a sofa in front of the television or a computer screen where they can learn about the perils of the modern world without actually being in harm’s way.
Where are the police? Where are the media to report on this crime wave? Where are the specialists who should be shrieking that we as a civilized society can’t possibly allow our children outside alone?
Who will save our children?
Bill McCalpin is president of the Friends of the Richardson Library. He also serves on the city’s library board and is the civic chair for the Reservation Neighborhood Association. He has an interest in writing on government and citizen participation in the city.
