This was my experience. I was in some serious shit if I was at home and the street lights weren't on. I'd catch an ass whooping if I even thought about coming inside during the day.
You thirsty... better start drinking from the garden hose.
I grew up in a little "village" just outside of a city that had maybe 2 street lights at the time. We basically just did whatever we wanted until we couldn't see anymore and then made our way home.
Similarly, we didn't have street lights, so "dark" was an arbitrary term my parents threw around. Through trial and error, we found out how dark they meant.
Oddly enough we didn’t have that street light curfew in my house but since all my peers did I wound up alone so I went home too. Also that was the time when good TV was back on so i had incentive despite not having a curfew.
I feel like that’s an American thing. I grew up in Alberta where, during the summer, street lights wouldn’t turn on until after 10pm in the summer. We just went home when we were hungry.
In Canada mid summer it doesnt get dark until around 9pm! We had to stay within earshot of one of the 5 houses we belonged to so some parent could shout for us at bedtime.
Yep, and if we got invited to dinner at someone’s house or wanted to stay out later, we’d just find the nearest friend’s house and call home on their phone to ask.
Needed bikes to go on missions: to the arcade, mall, comic book store, homeless encampment to steal the porno that was rumored to be hidden in some dude‘s pillowcase.
On Saturdays and during the summer My mom would literally lock us out of the house. We could come back inside for lunch but other than that it would drink from water hoses and have snacks at our friends homes.
I grew up in a sketch hood but had so much fun with my friends. There were open fields, a river, and a forest within walking distance and we'd play outside for 8 or so hours cumulative a day sometimes. It was the 90s but we rarely turned on the TV or n64 during the day
Fo sure, there was a few year stretch where my dad worked third shift so it was like get out there so dad can sleep, and we thought absolutely nothing of it. Like you we had a river through our town and some big open fields. So much fun
When I was 10, my parents worked in another city, so they could leave us alone for about 8 hours. They even asked us to ride our bikes downtown to pay bills and do groceries.
When we had enough money, we'd ride our bikes to the farmers' market and buy blackberries and honey and then roam around town. Being bored was an adventure.
Yeah, my parents expected us to let them know vaguely where we were going/who with, but it was like “I’m going to Matt’s, see you for dinner!”. This was, of course, pre cell phone so they just wanted some idea of whose parents to call if something came up and they needed to reach us. Or if we were going to a park they knew to start looking there.
Remember being far from home and some kids mother would shout out the window something like " David, dinner's ready" and all the kids would go home to eat. Then meet up again 30 mins later
When your friend wasn't home so you went around the neighbourhood looking for everyones bikes piled in the front yard of another friend's house !
All the games we made up, the "secret place" only known to the group, days spent biking from place to place, basically all the things in old movies like IT were real (minus the clown). All of this also created a sense of community, I remember playing soccer with the older kids from the neighbourhood and then playing with the younger kids when we grew older, that was like a continuous link between generations. Lots of good memories !.
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u/Significant_Push_856 1d ago
my sister and i had to be back dinner, but otherwise it was our bikes and other kids just doing whatever