Summer would hit, which would not affect my parent’s life whatsoever. They continued to do what they did. Usually, they went to work. They didn’t supervise us. We had nothing except our bikes and baseball gloves. We had a small assortment of Army men, a Tonka truck, a Luke Skywalker action figure, and a magnifying glass.
We had enough money in nickels, dimes, and quarters to get the cheapest thing from the ice cream truck. We always took a “time-out” for the ice cream truck. A Snickers was .35 cents. We drank from the hose. On the hottest days, we’d screw on the sprinkler to jump through eight streams of cold water. Always barefoot. Every day was an adventure because we had our bikes and could push the furthest boundaries of our neighborhood.
We had about 8-10 hours a day to meet strangers. We met new people all the time. We’d stumble upon some older kids smoking cigarettes in the woods that cussed us away. We discovered that one kid in the adjacent neighborhood across “the busy street” had a slip-and-slide. We could always find a pickup baseball game in an extra lot, a cul de sac, or at the school playground. We made new friends and necessary connections on our own. We didn’t have “play dates.” We knocked on our friend’s front door and asked, “Can Jonny play?” It was Yes or No. Sometimes, a fistfight settled things.
When we came home, the milk was cold, so we gulped it down. Our parents knew nothing of what we’d been up to. It’s not that they didn’t care, but it wasn’t a concern. We’d just been “playing,” and that took on a life of its own.
