“I suppose by those standards, we were abused as kids-when we were 8-12 years old, we had our legs switched with the small branches of dogwood and other flexible bushes, like other ranch kids did for doing stupid and dangerous stuff like going into the pasture with a bull then leaving the gate open, playing war with a real firearm or otherwise using one unwisely-and the gun(s) were taken away for weeks-we survived, too, but that was another time and place...”
Funny you should bring up the “Switch”. Brings back a story my Granny was telling my dad about when he and his sibling were young. When they were young she would have to use a switch on them to keep them from wondering on train tracks that were near by. You know the kind of train tracks I mean too, old fashion coal burning steam engines. She did not want them toddling on the tracks and a train run over them. She had to be harsh with that switch and make them stay from those tracks.
I later talked to my dad about that conversation. I noted that Grandma had “fear in her voice” as she spoke of that. Fear as if she could see them as toddlers and was afraid they’d go near those train tracks and be hit.
Point being in “another time and place” parents kept their kids from doing something incredibly stupid and being killed.
Today? No today we see Antifa protesters that walk in front of cars on the interstate!
You’re so right-I first noticed a change in the early/mid 80’s when a few of the cub’s friends didn’t seem to have any sense of safety or direction at all from their parents and they weren’t at all concerned about being punished for doing stupid and dangerous s***. It only took one scary incident before hubby and I would not allow her to do sleepovers, or be out after dark with those girls because we felt their parents were irresponsible and living in Lala land. Of course, the cub was certain she had the meanest, most unreasonable parents in the known universe-but at least she has never been so clueless and entitled to foolishly put her life in danger.
I’ve never seen a steam engine anywhere but in an exhibit or a novelty tourist ride-and I’ve only been on a train ride twice-when my 1st hubby and I took that fancy Amtrak trip they used to offer, and when we went on the scenic Copper Canyon train trip. Living in remote W Texas, we didn’t grow up near any train tracks-but the way sound carries out there, we could hear the trains on tracks miles away.