I’ve been reading the memoir of singer Jann Arden and thinking once again about how different the world is for children now. It’s sad. I think that we have created communities and lifestyles that don’t provide kids with the same opportunities we had to socialize, learn to play and have a measure of independence.
Arden’s life has many parallels to my own, which is probably why Falling Backwards has hit home with me. She is eight years younger and grew up on an acreage in Springbank, just west of Calgary, after her parents sold their house in the southwest part of the city. But we both had tons of freedom to go out and explore and play with our friends. My sisters and I were raised in a house in a distinctly working class neighborhood. Like Arden, our mother was the glue that held the family together, while our fathers both struggled with the pressures of being the main financial providers.
Arden and I shared a fascination with gophers (though being in a rural area, her friends had the advantage of air rifles) and of the thoughtless torture we put the animals through before they were finally killed. I have little doubt that it was those early experiences that left me with a distaste for violence. And, while I have never had a desire to own pets, I have a great aversion to those who mistreat animals.
With her two (male) buddies, Arden would head off to swim in the Killarney swimming pool as a pre-teen. The kids would pack up some snacks and take about three hours to make the several-mile walk into the city, occasionally tacking on a side trip to the bowling alley, which was even further away from their home.
A decade earlier, my friends and I spent long hours roaming the hills where the Market Mall now sits, often venturing down to the banks of the Bow River. We built rudimentary structures, trapped gophers and goofed around in the water (fishing would have been out of the question because our parents forbade us to go near the river).
On Saturdays we would go to the matinee at the Bowness movie theatre, walking because, even if we were lucky enough to have bus fare, the money was better spent on snacks. In the summer and on weekends, we took advantage of nice weather to spend all of our time away from home, returning only for meals. We considered ourselves lucky when somebody had a tent pitched in his yard and we could sleep in it. On one memorable day, when we were about 12, my friend Rick and I packed up lunches and a city map and rode our bikes across the city to the aquarium, which was located in a brewery, of all places. We made regular stops to pick up Sporstman cigarette packages because we collected the seemingly endless selection of fishing flies that were depicted on the back of each pack.
What are the chances today that children today share similar experiences, I wonder. Kids who spend their free time sending text messages on their cellphones, chatting with friends who are in the same mall (but not the same store) or being driven from one parent-planned activity to the next. Do they get the same chances we had to go outside and just play, making bows and arrows from sticks, climbing dangerously up trees or getting up enough friends together for a decent game of kick the can? It saddens me to think that my grandchildren won’t experience the same chances to play without adult supervision or interference, or to expand their imagination by simply looking around and creating their own world. My heart sinks when my two-and-a-half-year-old granddaughter reaches out to turn on the DVD player before she is even buckled into her car seat.
I’m not suggesting that we can, or even should, aspire to replicate the past. But I do wonder how the lack of play affects children’s ability to think creatively and to build their social skills.
Lorne Eckersley is the publisher of the Creston Valley Advance.