Monday, October 20, 2008

Just a Thought

On my way home this afternoon I had the misfortune to fall in line along with eight other cars behind a school bus taking its ease as it stopped every 2-3 minutes to drop another kidlet or two or three along its route. It would begin to flash its blinking yellow lights and then the red ones, before stopping and flapping its "STOP" signs on both sides, causing every car in the vicinity to come to an immediate halt. Never mind that traffic was starting to pile up in both directions, some of the kids that got off didn't even have the decency to cross the street! The ones that did cross did so in the leisurely manner befitting the entitled around whom the world revolves.

I am certainly in favor of pedestrian safety; I myself am a careful, courteous driver, but I'm not so sure that it is in our kids' best interest to teach them that every car on the road will stop the instant our little darlins' poke their little toes off the curb.

Maybe our kids would be better served if somewhere along the way we took some time to instill some personal responsibility, training them how to look both ways and cross the street safely. What a concept.

Do it for them, or teach them to do it for themselves...? A no-brainer in my book.

4 comments:

jlbo1981 said...

Amen sister!!

. said...

you know what would teach them a lesson and drive the message home?

run 'em over.


saying this makes me think about that little redheaded brat down the street. i wonder if he ever learned his lesson?

sterling river said...

When trying to negotiate school crossings near a highschool grammaw has noticed the same wild thing: kids stepping into the street without one glance at the traffic! They neither turned their heads or eyes to see if any cars nearby might not be stopping for them. It's plain that, having been taught that they themselves have no responsibility for their own safety or wellbeing, they have a wonderful trust and faith in all automobile drivers!

Mary said...

Hi, Mary. Good post. I was never able to train my children to look both ways before crossing the street. I tried everything. It drove me nuts. I can't believe they have survived.

Oh, yes, Abilene Christian University (I graduated in 1977) used to make everybody pass a swimming test before they could graduate!!!

Here is what they would do:

They had required P.E. classes, of course. Each semester, on an unknown day (Just like the Lord's second coming, nobody knew the day nor the hour!) while you were in the dressing room changing for P.E., a girl student sent by the P.E. department would come into the girls' dressing room and start passing out black one-piece swimsuits. We were ordered to change into them, and report to the swimming pool, just off the dressing room. The girls were ordered into the pool, and had to prove that they could tread water for 10 minutes. The professor was there watching, and the girl would take your name and mark it down if you could tread water for 10 minutes. If you could, they would mark that down, and you were ok. If you could not, they would mark that down, too, and recommend that you sign up for Women's Swimming I, or take the test again next year or whenever, when you could tread water for 10 minutes!!! I'm not making this up!!

(Same thing for the male students, but separately, of course, because people in the churches of Christ at that time did not believe in "mixed bathing".)

Me -- when I saw them passing out the black swimsuits, I high-tailed it out of there and ran home (I was a married student). Nobody noticed (I am a New Yorker, and can elbow my way through a crowd like nobody's business, without being seen). I had escaped that time, but what about in the future? A dilemma....

The next semester, I signed up for Women's Swimming I, because I wanted that diploma!!! I was terrified, but I was not the only girl who was terrified. Our teacher was Dee Nutt, and she was so kind and patient and had even us scaredy-cats actually floating by ourselves by day 3!!!

I learned to swim, even diving off the high dive into 12-foot water (it is an Olympic-sized pool)! I got an "A" in Women's Swimming, can you believe it? I still don't like the water, but at least I can tread it for 10 minutes!