I came home one day and the neighbor’s kids were waiting by my gate. Their football had ended up behind my fence and they wouldn’t go into the yard without permission.
There are still good kids out there. That was awhile ago, one of them is now at West Point.
The kids were 6, 8 and 9 years old.
I told them to go home.
The 9 year old looked at me and said "Our mom said we could play here."
The kids were jumping off my patio table, down three stairs to the lower deck and landing in a portable sandbox. Any one of them could've gotten seriously hurt.
I phoned the mother and told her to come pick up her children, they were not welcome in my yard when no one was home.
She apparently didn't care that no one was home, nor that her kids were unsupervised and had apparently been playing in my yard and on my deck for several hours according to one neighbor. My yard is about an acre, the kids had to walk across 4 yards (about 4 acres) to get to my house.
When the mother refused (REFUSED!) to pick up the kids and didn't see the danger of their playing near my house unsupervised, I took them by the hand and walked them home. One of them was kicking and screaming the entire way.
When I got them home, the mother came out screaming that I had laid a hand on her children and she called the county sheriff.
Thankfully the county sheriff had the good sense to see what was going on, that the woman was a complete lunatic, and told her to keep her children under supervision.
It helped that I also know the sheriff's deputies out here, but not everyone has that luxury.
The bottom line is, parenting seems to be a lost skill. Kids run around and do whatever they want, and the parents seemingly always defend the kids.
Last word: anyone who reads this and gets offended, maybe you should be. You're probably the type of parent that's causing the problem with today's youth and their lack of responsibility & accountability. Shape up.
And when my son’s football landed in the neighbor’s yard, he went to knock on the door and asked politely if he might go into the back yard and get it back. She turned him down. Footballs are not cheap, and he is a sweet, hardworking young man who was trying very hard to improve himself. This does not do much for neighborly relations. I am going to have to go have a talk with Mrs. B**** myself. She should consider herself fortunate that I’m a lovely neighbor.
As they should have.
These kids you site here have parents who have taught them some basic respect for others property. You see there is a difference in how parents rear their children, and the very fact that you sited as to how one of those kids is now attending West Point, proves the point.