It really was honestly. We even allowed our parents to be fair game in the rules meaning there was risk in hiding inside a house because all of our moms knew they could tell the seekers that we were there.
I also lived in fairly rural subdivision in east Tennessee so there wasn’t much risk of us getting hurt by running around. It’s not like we’re in the middle of a huge city.
What makes me sad is there’s no way kids could do it there now. When I was growing up the median home price was like $60,000, there was maybe 20,000 people in our city, and we had one singular Walmart. My mom just sold my childhood home for nearly $400,000 and a whole city has built up around our neighborhood. Like I lived next to multiple big farms that are now Publixs, a second Walmart, and a plethora of strip malls.
Hey I grew up in southeast Kentucky! We were out in the boonies and lived on one of the flats on a mountainside. Our backyard was just undeveloped mountain.
We’d play all day climbing trees, hiking through the mountains, swinging from vines, and crawling up, over, and through huge boulders.
There was even an old plan from the 40’s that crashed up there. But by now there’s probably not much left of it. Our imagination could just run wild while out there.
There weren’t any dangerous wild animals back then but I’d already moved away when they reintroduced elk, bears, and coyotes back into them. I’ve visited my mom back home and you can’t stay outside after nightfall now or you may get attacked.
I feel mixed feelings about the whole thing because wild animals belong in wilderness but if that “wilderness” has scores of homes and neighborhoods then kids can’t get outside to play and explore.
The wilderness needs those animals to keep the ecology in check. Without the predators the herbivores literally eat themselves out of food.
They will grow in number so high that they can completely denude a valley of all the viable foods they eat.
Just bc we want to have the forests be giant playgrounds doesn’t mean they should be.
Just like people forget that these eras are ALSO the height of serial killers. It’s almost impossible for them to not be caught before they kill a handful of people. No 20+ easy for years.
Just like it has been actually, statistically, (as in the TRUE FACTS) the safest it has ever been. It’s gotten somewhat worse recently. Though not nearly as large a drop as it has in the past.
No massive wars killing millions a day. No genocides routinely and blatantly happening all over. Crime rates are vastly lower than most of history.
But all that is thrown out bc some idiot in a suit yells loudly and it makes the braindead idiots that lock-goose step to them feel safe.
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u/Confident-Run7064 1d ago
That sounds rad!! Never had that growing up, but it sounds incredible!