Is it possible to still have a "Huckleberry Finn" childhood?

[EddieIzzardismyhero]

Have just finished reading "21st Century Boys" and found it a very interesting, if somewhat depressing read.

I have two sons, both under two at the moment so this is not something pressing. But I found myself musing on the type of childhood I would be able to offer them in comparison to the one I enjoyed myself.

I was brought up in the 70s in a small town in the west country and I remember long sunny days spent exploring the local fields and forests, hours spent playing out without adult supervision, running out of the house first thing in the morning and coming back only when you were hungry . . . Does this still exist anywhere in this country anymore?

We live in a market town in the SE of England. We live in a cul-de-sac but rarely see children playing out, partly because moronic drivers race up and down the road as if they're competing in F1 . We have lots of parks and open spaces but children are rarely unsupervised.

I would love to give my boys the kind of childhood I enjoyed but is it possible now? Does anyone else do it? Would I be on my own (and hence my children would be on their own too)?

Interested in your thoughts.

that should be 'I'd rather my kids didn't have the roam thing'

I would like my DC to have more freedom so we're moving out of the city to the seaside where I hope they can sail if nothing else. It makes me really sad that you never see groups of kids just doing their own thing anymore unless they can't go home because their parents are in the pub

I agree with the last post I don't think they need to roam to be happy but they do need the outdoors,time to be bored and less screentime and materialism.

We are lucky enough to live in Devon after battling to get back to the South West for quite some time. Aside from being near family the pull was the lifestyle for our dc.

We live in a busy market town with quite a close community,very close to moors,the sea and woods where we spend most of our free time.My dc are 6,6 and 5 and currently play in our little road/neighbours gardens unsupervised. Our road is full to bursting with kids.

I think trust is key and one day I hope to be able to let them roam further but to the point I roamed I don't know.However during the holidays/weekends we roam as a family and dp and I are starting to sit in the middle of the moor/ by the sea for a while whilst they buggar off.I dress them in bright clothes so we can see them at a distance. We're starting to camp again and are picking sites where kids can roam more as our garden is too small.

There isn't much materialism down here as most people are very outdoorsy, have given up decent salaries to be near family or for the lifestyle and are battling to stay down here.

Having said all that I think an enjoyable stimulating childhood is what you make it. I know several cities fairly well(Bristol,Bath,Sheffield,London and Nottingham) and all bar Nottingham(sorry but I hated living there) I feel I could have provided an enjoyable/similar childhood but in some ways it would have taken more organising and it would be less easy so to speak.

I think this idealistic view of the past and a country childhood is all very well but times have changed and most places have plenty to offer growing kids. If we lived in Bristol my kids would be old hands at traveling on buses and we'd have the museum,library,the downs,Ashton Court,cafes to hang out in etc. Personally I'd hunt out a community to live in as I think this is very beneficial to kids but communities are everywhere.

Funnily enough we are constantly dragging our kids to London,Bristol etc as I feel a Devon childhood idyllic as it may seem can be a tad provincial and maybe at danger of being a bit limited.I don't want my kids to shrink in fear if they end up living in cities or up country on their own I also want them to be able to stand on their own two feet and see what the world out there has to offer. I have friends who feel the same way.

Sorry not the last post but Drosphilia's post.

Do you know this is interesting

I harked on about this a while back (my worries about a capitalist society) and got slated

I wanted to look at the positives of non capitalist societies (namely tribal living) and see if we could inject some of that into our society.

There are many positives that have been a result of modern living (better medical care for example and even simple things like clean running water) but well being and mental health in children and adults has suffered for many, because of a target driven and achievement based society.

Less freedom for children is one consequence of such living.

I don't just moan, I believe I try to live by my principles. However I also appreciate that such issues are not black and white. What some see as freedom others would see as neglect

I have only skim read so apologies if I am duplicating or misinterpreting anyone.

The views on here seem to be incredibly polarised - cooped up or free range kids, town or country, helicopter parenting or neglect - surely the true idyllic childhood is a blend of these?

One thing that I would say is a "must" is outdoor time, but what that is depends on your circumstances. If you live in a commuter rat run, or where there are no other kids around, your back garden or a local park will do. When I chose DD3's pre-school one thing that impressed me was the need for all weather gear, as the weather has to be exceptionally bad for them not to send the kids out for a play come rain/shine/snow.

TV/computer games are the worst thing for kids if they are allowed unlimited access. A bit of each is fine, but humans are designed to need fresh air and exercise. I know myself that if we have been lazy and stayed inside all day we are all tetchy.

When children are outside they should be left to play - if you are uncomfortable with leaving them to their own devices, perhaps because it's a communal area, take a book and at least pretend to read while you keep an eye out so that your DC feels that they are in charge of his/herself.

I'm v lucky - this summer DD2 is going out to play by herself and call for her friends - she's 7. The rule is that she tells me if she goes into anyone's house/garden so that I know where she is. There are about 7 kids aged 5 - 9 that now get together in various combinations and usually end up in someone's back garden after having a scooter around. We live in a cul de sac on a modern estate, so no through traffic but we have all drummed into our kids to keep an eye out for cars/bikes and yes, we do twitch the curtains and peep out to check on them!

I often lose track of where my DS1 (5) is playing! But, as we live at the end of a cul de sac and all our neighbours have children, I can soon find him.

The children are aged 3 to 12 and usually start the day playing on their bikes, scooters, scates, etc on the street (homemade wooden ramps = hours of amusement) before moving into various gardens. By pure chance, one garden has a trampoline, another has a huge tree house, another has a climbing frame, etc.

Along the way, they are fed an assortment of snacks, juice and ice cream. Sometimes DS1 will wander in my front door scoffing a sausage sandwich.

I love that he has this freedom to choose where to go. There's always an adult somewhere nearby and the kids are more traffic aware than most I know. As soon as a car pulls into the road, a cry of "CAAARRR!!!" goes up and they all move onto the pavement, even the little ones.

DS1 recently took the stabilisers off his bike and rode it round the biggest garden with all his mates shouting encouragement!

DP and I are currently building an extension because we never want to leave this neighbourhood!

Wonders through thread singing ole man river

My kids play out all the time from about the age of four, and we have a field nearby where they frolic around like something out of Little House on the Prairie, building dens and suchlike. Once they are road aware, I also let them cycle around freely as long as they have helmets on (totally strict house rule).

Lots of other parents around here do this, but there is a small faction of worryworts who whinge on about how we should glue ourselves to the children's sides like limpets in case some dread things happens to them; the local head teacher being one of these idiots.

Hi Housemum

I agree with laying down a few rules but then leave them to get on with it. Do get them to be car aware. The 'CAAARRR' shout only started in our cul-de-sac after my daft daughter got hit by a car. It was at low speed but the sight of her hobbling around on crutches for a few weeks did act as a constant reminder.

I had a lovely childhood, some of which was spent in a rural village in Ireland. Our house was in an estate which bordered only on fields. We spent may a summers day in the fields near our house, having picnics, paddling in the stream, catching minnows in jars, that sort of thing. We spent a lot of time out on bikes as well, most families had only one car and that was for the Dads to get to work in, so there was pretty much no traffic in the estate during the day.

I now live in a different Irish village, less rural than the first, although the first one has now probably expanded hugely in size and population too. Last summer, ds1 made a friend in a neighbouring estate and they spent most days away from home, padding in rivers etc, making dens and so on.

I nearly freaked out! I hated not knowing where he was, was worried as I didn't know the boys family very well and was almost happy when it was time to go back to school. But he is my PFB, I'm sure when ds4 is the same age, I will be throwing him out the door to do similar!

Growing up in 70s and 80s there were 7-8 cars in our road of approx 100 houses now I live in a cul de sac of 10 houses there are 18 cars. We had a community where parents felt they could tell other peoples children off if they were'nt behaving themselves now we have some parents defending their children's appalling behaviour and in the process degrading kids respect for adult authority. There was also security in numbers when most children in the road played unsupervised now due to traffic problems, people not wanting to get involved with supervising other peoples kids the child who is allowed to play out is usually alone. I'm really sadden how our society has made it so difficult for children to enjoy the unsupervised play we had not so long ago and I feel we have lost something fundamentally important to our society.

If you want your kids to have an exciting childhood you just have to grit your teeth and let them go. i live out in the sticks. We have fields, a stream, a tree house, some very fast quadbikes and a few hundred acres of woodland behind us. it is a kids paradise but I have had to aceept i dont always know where they are and what they are doing. I have learnt to go with the flow - also, we have no mobile phone signal so I dont send them off with phones. My kids are a bit like the dogs - they come back when they are hunngry

Just to add the only time our dc can roam is when we go camping and we go camping alot because of this. I feel unsupervised play gives children the opportunity to naturally development important skills such as getting along , rolling with the punches, negotiation and road safety and I think our parents had a more relaxed attitude to parenting because we could play without them having to make provision to ensure we were constantly supervised by an adult

Really, though, don't beat yourself up if you can't let them roam, except maybe on the odd holiday.

Your garden is a world unto itself if you have one.

It's about valuing imagination and fantasy, about making these and a hint of magic a part of your lives.

We don't have a garden.

But we saw some friends who had one this past week, and just turned them all loose.

And that, well, what can you say? They had a blast.

Fantasy is chucking a blanket or sheet over the table and making it a fort, a house, a castle, a ship.

Playing hide and seek in the house on a cold winter evening.

Hunting for sea glass, pretending it may be leftover pirate fare or even treasure, maybe from a bottle of rum - Yohoho! And a bottle of rum!

It's about telling stories. Stories in song, even.

About visiting places at the weekend or in summer - castles, ruins, stone circles, places. Pointing out the wee isle in a loch. And the tale that goes with it.

Legend has its place here.

And I make sure mine are full of it.

Giving them a name. A name and what it means.

A place, a flower, a Gaelic translation of something.

What was her story?

It's about valuing things that, if you don't, might be lost.

Not just imagination. But, say, food production. British food production and farming.

Showing them where their food comes from.

Teach them traditional remedies and their native flora and fona. Like my friend, her daughter ran up to her with nettle stings and she told her to find docken leaves, where to go to find them, how did they look.

Even cities have farmer's markets.

Honour the seasons. Honour nature. Honour the heavens.

If they see you doing it, so will they.

It's not just about letting them loose.

It's about showing them, that they live in one of the most beautiful, magical places on Earth.

And why.

And spreading that, in any way possible.

No question is a dumb question or one you don't have time for.

We holiday here. In caravans whilst DS is still so young and I am still recovering from my PND.

But later, in camps.

Teach them about their own environment, and why it is so important.

Wow expat, on that very philosophical post I'm off to bed!

it's not a new thing.

i remember back in the early 90s i worked with a woman called laura house.

she was a born comedienne. she later wrote at least one show, on MTV long ago, called Austin Stories. she could make a stone laugh.

but even then, she'd despair.

she did terribly in school.

she wasn't good at exam-taking.

but she was creative and imaginative beyond belief. i was so jealous of her abilities.

I think that in the end people bring up their children in a way that is natural to them.

I love our lifestyle - we live away from the road and have these interconnecting gardens so that our children do have some freedom (which gives us more time).

However, most people would hate to live where we live because we can't park near the house and have to always walk a distance to the car. Our house is also quite small.

Equally, because I need a lot of fresh air to survive (nevermind the children) we walk to our nearest school (through a field) which most of the village children don't go to (it's not a middleclass school).

I hate having the television on, so we don't have one. So, we probably do have the huckleberry finn lifestyle but I haven't noticed anyone around us trying to achieve the same. In the end, the draw of their car is too much, they want a larger house, they like a garage and they are prepared to fight through traffic to get their children to a boden school.

The other thing that props up this outdoorsy life is capitalism and the fact that - in modern times - bright, academic people are rewarded financially. Is this right or not? Probably not, but it enables us to earn a good amount of money in a small time and thus not have to have the youngest in nursery for too long.

So, we appear to live an old fashioned, out door life, but it is financed by our earning power and enabled by modern technology. I actually worry that our children will be so used to living in an idyllic valley that they will get a shock when older to discover that little cottages in idyllic places need city salaries to purchase.

On a more positive note, though, we are involved in a bit of a hippy playgroup and actually there are plenty of families in it who live in town in smaller terraced houses and still live most of their lives outside, walking everywhere, keeping chickens in their small garden and living comfortably, but without luxuries and holidays, off one modest salary.

Having read this thread over the last few days, I feel really lucky that fate and the choices dh and I have made over the last 17 years has led us to where we are now. We live modestly on one income, we don't have holidays or weekends away except to visit friends, but we grow our own vegetables, raise chickens for eggs, and meat soon, pigs are planned in for next year, we have dogs, cats...a mouse....(don't ask), and we live in a small cottage (and it is small) with 3 acres of land, surrounded by farmland, and have a little wood next to our fields, which my oldest two play in most days. DS (7) is reading Enid Blyton Magic farway tree series, and I think he is living it too. We haven't got money for extravagances at all, ever penny is frugally accounted for, but my kids are living all the good bits of a "Huckleberry Finn" lifestyle. On sunny days they go into the garden and fields coated in sunblock, and they come back when called for drinks, snacks or lunch and dinner. My dd has been doing this with her brother since she was 3 (although she never left our field at this age). They spend their days finding bugs, watching birds, tracking animals, climbing trees, digging, planting, making dens....all that sort of thing. They always stay in the small valley we are in, I can always shout them and they can too and we will hear, but they are independent, responsible sensible and adventurous, and I think that is an amazing combination, just what our parents gave us in two quite different parts of the UK

My ds has a lifethreatening condition diagnosed last September, we could wrap him in cotton wool, but we believe that would take away the richness of his life, so we set clear safe boundaries, dos and don'ts, they always ask permssion to go to the wood, they never go alone, but together or with friends when they come to play. They know which trees to climb and which to avoid, how high to go, what wasps look like as opposed to bees, how to find a dock leaf if they get a nettle sting, never to eat berries. We are lucky in that we are so remote, although only 10 mins from a village, and 15 from a market town, that no-one ever comes our way unless they are neighbours, or twice a year a large rambling group.

We have given up, and continue to give up, many things to get to this place, and every one has been worth it. I know to some people our lifestyle would be horrific, but to me every day (well especially sunny ones like to today) I feel blessed with luck.

Some very interesting posts. I do hope that once my boys are older I'll have the courage to let them go - my worry is most definitely cars and not stranger danger, and unfortunately, aside from doing what I can to teach road sense, there's not much I can do about other people's driving.

Luckily dh and I are both very keen on camping and outdoor activities so that's may be where we need to head to give the boys their taste of freedom. Moving out of the area we live really isn't a practical option for us so we will need to seek alternatives.

Lots of food for thought . . .

I live on the edge of London in a quiet cul-de-sac where most of the children played out from a young age. DS now 14 went off for the day with his friends yesterdy, they bought a disposable bbq and sausages and cooked themselves lunch in the park, they then camped overnight in one of their gardens and apparently was kept awake by the church clock going off every 15 minutes.
Yesterday he did have a very idyllic day with his mates.
We are fortunate that we also have an outdoor adventure type place within walking distance so my DCs have learnt to climb, kayak and cave and they are scouts/guides and have had the freedom of camping in a wonderful site where they are free to roam.

My children do play out. I have posted about this before on MN. Yesterday DS rode his bike down to the wood with a friend, went swimming in the plunge pools in the stream, came back, got his tent and went to camp in a field at the other end of the village with his friend. They are 12. This is the first year they have been allowed to swim on their own, as although it isn't deep enough to get out of your depth, I have worried as you can drown in a few inches of water if you hit your head.

DS also cycles into town and plays in the park there sometimes with friends or goes in the library on his own. That is about 3 miles away. He also gets 2 buses back from school and waits in town between buses.

By the time he is 14, I expect he will be able to travel into Manchester on his own, which is 40 mins away from our local town on the train. I would expect him to be able to attend a gig at the MEN arena with a friend by train, which I think is a very safe venue that he is familiar with.

DD is 9. She is allowed to walk to the nearest shop, and to play on the moor and walk to friends' houses. I would not let her swim unsupervised until she is 12.

I find it very worrying that many children have limited experience of using roads as pedestrians or cyclists, and yet their parents put them behind the wheel of a car between 17 and 20.

MillyR

Very good point regarding learning to drive...how can a 17 year old appreciate the dangers of their vehicle if they've never been allowed to be a pedestrian.

Saying that, 17 year olds are programmed not to worry about danger - you think you're invincible at that age.

Sorry for not answering omnishambles earlier. Friday is my day off when I'm writing, and I've been out to play in the fabulous weather all day. You'll find the UNICEF report on
www.unicef.org/media/files/ChildPovertyReport.pdf
But neither Japan nor S. Korea was included because the data wasn't available.