I grew up in an outlying neighborhood in Jackson Miss with maybe 200 homes in it surrounded by woods etc.
We were given time limits (dark thirty) but we could go anywhere but down to the store about a half mile away on the boulevard without permission....farmland, golf course etc
There were a couple of feminine boys that stayed close to home and one couple of kids whose daddy was a cop were real strict but the rest of us roamed...scores of us
Best of all men were men and women were women, guys were guys and gals were gals...nobody had to figure that out....any ‘thing’ else was just that.
I am a girl and when I played with my girlfriends we played at home, mine or theirs. But I was the only kid with a horse and when I rode I was alone and I went miles and miles on city streets and open country as well. If someone had kidnapped me my parents would not have a clue where to begin looking.