Stuff you did as a child that wouldn’t be contemplated now

From a very early age I hopped on a bus to go to school 2 miles away. The stop was nowhere near the school, but I found my way there.

Coming home, I let myself in as my parents worked cose by. My dad popped home to light the gas mantle, and I entertained myself until one parent came home

During holidays, I would leave at an early hour with my friends and return home early evening, starving.

No babysitter, I looked after myself.

I also knocked on random doors and took babies out in their prams.

Around 14, I travelled from Scotland to Ireland on my own, even spending a night in a hotel. My mother did as much of the arranging as she could, but after my evening meal, I went for a wander around the Dublin streets. The next day, I had to get to the train station, and at the other end, in the middle of nowhere, I was picked up by my aunt. No car, shanks pony, so at least 2 miles.

I cringe now when I think of what could have happened.

I live in a small, quiet cul de sac and children are not allowed to play in their small front gardens. It has gone from one extreme to the other.

Before I’d started school at 5 1/2, my mother sent me more than once to shops a good 15 minute walk away, with money and a list.
She was once very cross because I came back with the wrong flour - I couldn’t yet read so had no idea that it was wrong. Looking back, I dare say it was all the smallish village shop had.

To be entirely fair to my mother, she had two considerably younger ones at home, and certainly no car.
It was in the 50s, so very few cars about anyway.

When we lived at that house, the milkman used to come with a horse!

I remember children taking babies out for a walk , I couldn’t understand the fun in that ! I had a baby sister and taking her out was a boring task , stopped when I left her outside the library and walked home without her , too busy reading my book

I must have been about eight when a teacher from my school used to invite me to his house for tea.
His wife and daughter ,
who went to my school were there .
I don't recall either of them being that warm and friendly.
We very occasionally went out .
I was never alone with him .
He used to buy me birthday and Christmas presents .
He was a very quiet handsome man and always behaved in a fatherly way towards me .
I don't remember my parents being particularly concerned about it .
I think that my mother once asked if he touched me .
Today it would be considered strange if not odd and not advisable nor appropriate .
I wouldn't have allowed my children to go to a teacher's house nor out with him .

I remember walking to the paper shop for my dad to get the Sunday papers.. I bought for him.. The Sunday Express, The People and I got the Jack and Jill comic.. Must have been about 5 or 6 years old.
I have two GC aged 5 years... Can not ever imagine them being sent out to do this task.

aggie

I remember children taking babies out for a walk , I couldn’t understand the fun in that ! I had a baby sister and taking her out was a boring task , stopped when I left her outside the library and walked home without her , too busy reading my book

I wasn't very interested in babies either.

There was a couple I chatted to because they lived round the corner from my friend and they had a dog I liked. As we didn't have a dog, I asked if I could take him for walks and off we'd go, this little dog and me, roaming across the Common on our own once a week.

aggie 😲😂
Hope someone found her and brought her home!

Yes, a horse-drawn cart arrived where I lived and my mother would go running out with a dustpan and brush to pick up the horses' droppings.

My late mum aged 9y had to take baby sister out in the pram before being allowed to join her friends who were ‘plaung out’.
She said she used to angle the pram so that the sun was shining on her sister’s face. She cried, had to scrunch her eyes shut, got tired quicker and fell asleep. Job done my mum said!

*playing out

Blimey!

From the age of 6 I went to school alone which involved crossing a busy road. I also went to the local park which had some equipment which would now be regarded as pretty dangerous for young children to play on unsupervised.

The primary motif of my parents seemed, on reflection, to get me out from under their feet. I would be told "be back for your lunch/tea/whatever" and then expected to make myself scarce. My friends and I played on bombed sites, railroad tracks, by rivers and in muddy steams and fields. We made dens in the trees and invented games without any adult intervention. We formed and reformed friendship groups without investment from parents or schools. I believe it made us stronger and more resillient people.

Not me but my kids.
I let them go on bike rides for several miles unaccompanied by adults. On rural roads.
Now I shudder at what could have happened.

NotSpaghetti I actually think children are capable of so much more than we give them credit for.

That is so true. Many moons ago when I was teaching, one of ‘my’ children, aged just five, caught the bus to school on her own as usual. The journey was about 1 1/2 hours, plus a 30 minute walk. One day the bus broke down.

The school was small, so we all knew about her getting the bus to school. Of course, when she didn’t arrive there was a panic and after contacting the parents it was decided that the police should be notified. They searched for her without success.

Hours later, this little tot eventually turned up at school. She had remembered the entire bus route and walked the whole way, from bus stop to bus stop, which included crossing very busy South London main roads! How she managed it unscathed is unbelievable!

When I was 6or7 my Mum put me on the train at Paddington she asked a lady to make sure I got off at Cardiff my Grandparents found me on the platform. I remembered I was terrified as we went in the long tunnel under the Severn it was black noisy and very smoky as a window was open no one warned me but at least a kind lady gave me a sandwich. Can you imagine 😱

Much the same as most of you, walked to and from school one side of the town to the other. All winds and weathers. Sometimes went off to my Nans in another part.
School holidays were always spent at my paternal grandparents, in a small village, but joined in with the local children around my age the whole time I was there (coincidentally along with another friend from same town as me) and we used to go off on our bikes all over the place. Often to one of the other villages.
We used to pack up a picnic and go across fields to the river, by a weir, and spend hours in the water. Would also catch the bus into town and go to the swimming pool.
We would be out by about 9am, pop in for lunch and back out asap, back for evening meal and if it was still light enough off out again. Running about all over the place, playing games. Scrumping apples.
Never did any damage or caused harm.

Allira

aggie 😲😂
Hope someone found her and brought her home!

I was sent back to get her , it was 3 streets away , she was still asleep
She still dines out on her abandonment 🤣

Charleygirl5

Yes, a horse-drawn cart arrived where I lived and my mother would go running out with a dustpan and brush to pick up the horses' droppings.

I used to get sent out to pick up any horse dung from the street, and also go up the field with a bucket to collect sheep droppings for the leeks!

We lived on a farm & in the summer holidays a lot of the children I went to school with used to come with their mums to pick the (soft) fruit. The rule was, if you were tall enough to reach the lowest fruit, you helped pick in the mornings & then in the afternoons you could play in the woods or make dens from the fruit crates.
Dad used to pick everyone up in an old Bedford van with homemade bench seats bolted in the back. The drivers door was tied open for fresh air & our dog used to lie on that side next to Dads feet. If he had to brake suddenly everyone's sandwiches rolled about in the back, babies were grabbed from all sides & once the dog fell out onto the road!
Our teeth were stained purple all through the blackcurrant season.
The older children looked after the younger ones & I remember trying to feed a toddler some pies we'd made of mud with a loganberry filling! We got told off a lot & learnt a lot & had masses of fun.No sunscreen on any of us - we were brown as nuts.

aggie

Allira

aggie 😲😂
Hope someone found her and brought her home!

I was sent back to get her , it was 3 streets away , she was still asleep
She still dines out on her abandonment 🤣

Oh, thank goodness!
"My sister didn't love me - do you know what she did!?" 😂

Starting a career in banking aged 15

Not sure if anyone else was into making dens, was an all consuming past time for the kids I played with, we lived near a housing estate being built in the early sixties and we nicked stuff the building crews left lying around to build our den. Then boys would come along and destroy our den and take our stuff so we would plot to do likewise to them.

My friend and I belonged to the London Cooperative Choir.
It was a 20 minute journey by train and then a tube to kings Cross. We were 11/12 yrs old and it was on a Friday evening,

Can you imagine 2 young girls travelling to that part of London . We returned at about 9 o’clock and my dad would pick us up from our local station.

Doesn’t bear thinking about now.,

When I was still very little, during the 1950s, I regularly used to cross a very busy main road to get to the corner shop where I bought ten Craven A cigarettes for my mum and I was allowed to spend the change on sweets. I don't know of any shops that would not sell cigarettes to young children back then.

When I was about eight or nine I often used to travel on the London Underground from East London to the Natural History Museum in Kensington by myself.

Whitewavemark2

I was thinking after writing about a favourite walk about what I did as a child that you simply couldn’t imagine being allowed now.

When I was 6, my parents lived in Plymouth. I remember a holiday when my mother saw me onto a train in Plymouth on my own (I assume the guard was keeping his eye on me) I changed at Oakhampton and travelled into Cornwall to Delabole ( our family village) and spent the school holidays with my aunt and uncle. I was 6 years old!!

I also travelled from my family home in Plymouth two bus stops away which included crossing a main road to my grandparents home!

Wasn’t there a station just outside Delabole?I seem to remember walking past it.