Missing Children

I just came back from my daily walk with “the baby” and I noticed that something was missing.  There were no children outside playing, no running footsteps, no laughs or giggles, no little bike riders.  Of course, it had been raining earlier in the day but the sun was bright in the sky as Mica and I made our daily pilgrimage around town.  Then it dawned on me that I don’t see a lot of children outside on any given day. 

When I was a child, my best friend and I spent countless hours outdoors playing all sorts of games and using our imaginations to invent others.  We hosted tea parties in the backyard fit for queens and countesses using our plastic dish sets which Santa left under the tree one Christmas.  We played hopscotch and tiddly winks. We tried our best to keep a hula hoop going round and round, unaware of the benefits of exercise we were getting at the same time.  We played ball with other children, we jumped rope, we played “Simon Says”, “Hide and Seek,” and “Mother, May I” and if we wanted to visit another friend, we certainly never even considered asking our parents for a ride to her house.  We walked to the store to pick up something our mothers wanted and we chatted and skipped our way there and back. Playing outside was a year round activity.  In the winter, we built snow forts and careened down a hill on slides (sleds) or whatever else fit the bill.  Sometimes I even joined my brother and his friends for a game of street hockey, but that was only if they were desperate for another player and a “lousy girl” was all they could find to fill the space.  No matter what the season, my friends and I always managed to find something fun to do outdoors.  Surprisingly, I don’t ever remember feeling bored.

Today’s kids live a completely different lifestyle, yet I wonder is it really a better one?  Sure, their parents may counter, they are involved in sports and other activities.  While that may be true, it seems that the “play” has been taken out of many of these events and most, if not all, are highly structured and competitive.  The spontaneity is gone and possibly the real fun as well.  With all the electronics and gaming systems available today, many children spend a great deal of time in fantasy play while their bikes and baseball bats lie idle in the yard. 

A recent medical study issued a warning that should make society sit up and take notice.  It said that an alarming number of children are now overweight, too sedentary, and likely to have a shorter life span than their parents.  Where’s the fun in that?