麻豆传媒

A glimpse inside the child and parent relationship today:

Child: 鈥淢om, I鈥檓 going over to Xander鈥檚 house after school to play Fortnite!鈥�

Mom: 鈥淥kay, but I need to know what route you鈥檙e taking after you leave the school!聽 Text me just before you two leave the building and then right after you get to his house!聽 Have his mom text me too, just to be sure!聽 Oh, and don鈥檛 let the teriyaki sauce touch the seared ahi tuna in your bento box until you sit down for lunch, otherwise it鈥檒l just get over marinated!聽 You know what?聽 Text me a pic of your lunch when you sit down so I can make sure everything looks good!鈥�

Child (having aged several years by this point): 鈥淎nything else?鈥�

Mom: 鈥淵es.聽 I want a full report when you get home of everything you two talked about.聽 And tell Xander鈥檚 mom we need a girls鈥� night!聽 Okay, have a great day of learning, my little prince who can do absolutely no wrong!鈥�

*snaps 47 pictures of Child exiting house to go to school, posts them immediately to Instagram*

A glimpse inside my relationship with my parents 25 years ago:

Me: 鈥淢om, Dad, I鈥檓 meeting the guys at the park and we鈥檙e biking out to the canal.聽 We heard there鈥檚 a dead hobo out there, so we鈥檙e gonna go poke him and stuff.鈥�

Dad: 鈥淲hen you get home, we have to go and clean out the horse stalls at the barn.鈥�

Mom: 鈥淒on鈥檛 go bringing any dead hobo back here and expect ME to clean up after it!鈥�

I鈥檓 using some exaggerated narrative here, but I鈥檓 also not that far off in both scenarios.聽 After all, it wasn鈥檛 really a hobo; for all we knew, he had an office job somewhere鈥�

The stuff we got into as kids, especially being small town kids, is the kind of stuff that would probably get the cops involved today and parents on every blacklist known to man.聽 Well, maybe not the actual police, but certainly the PC Police who believe it鈥檚 their job to 鈥渞ight鈥� the 鈥渨rongs鈥� perpetrated by complete strangers who they don鈥檛 know.

Take 鈥楰nock Knock, Ginger鈥�, for instance.聽 Oh, I鈥檓 sure there are other names for this 鈥済ame鈥� that lots of people of my generation grew up taking part in, but the gist is the same: one kid walks up to the front door of a house, knocks on the door (or rings the doorbell, which kind of defeats the name of the game), and then makes a run for it back to their gaggle of friends snickering and salivating in hair-brained, sophomoric anticipation.聽 The end result is simply an annoyed fellow citizen who was forced to answer their door only to see a blank doorstep.聽 Cue the snickering and the giggling across the street and behind some parked cars.聽 Rinse and repeat until it鈥檚 all out of your system.

鈥楰nock Knock, Ginger鈥� sure wouldn鈥檛 fly today.聽 Well, to be fair, it didn鈥檛 fly back then either, but back in the mid to late 90鈥檚 it was simply a lame nighttime activity to get a cheap thrill out of some juvenile juveniles.聽 I suppose I should take this opportunity to apologize to anyone out there whose door that I or my friends may have knocked on around 20-25 years ago.

There, are we good?聽 I鈥檓 not going to get 鈥渃ancelled鈥� by the Twitterati, am I?

It simply boils down to two different generations that have two different perspectives on the world around them.聽 The biggest and most glaring difference between childhoods now and those from 20+ years ago is the rise of one device and its related service 鈥� the smartphone and social media.

Now, instead of relying on your kid鈥檚 word that they鈥檒l call you from their friend鈥檚 house when they get there after school, you can glue the latest Apple device right to their hand.聽 I swear, it鈥檚 like some of these kids had phones surgically implanted in them almost right out of the womb.聽 Facetime apps, texting, location trackers, virtual check-ins; there鈥檚 no escape from Mom and Dad in 2021, junior.聽 Helicopter parenting, indeed.

My friends and I were the types to go out at all hours of the night, mostly to go cruising in one of our vehicles, but sometimes even if it was just to take a walk around town.聽 It didn鈥檛 matter what time it was to us because we were on no one else鈥檚 clock but our own.聽 Go walk around Outlook at 2:00 in the morning?聽 Why not?聽 It was a still summer鈥檚 night and we felt bottled in back at Mitch鈥檚 house.聽 Today, if you saw three teens walking around town after midnight, you might feel compelled to text a neighbour or even post something on that eye-rolling Bulletin Board page on Facebook.

I don鈥檛 even want to imagine trying to grow up as we did if smartphones, social media and ultra-sensitive parents were around.聽 Honestly, not only would it have just sucked the fun out of growing up, but it also would have eliminated a lot of life lessons that my siblings, my friends and I learned along the way.聽 Our parents didn鈥檛 turn a blind eye to everything and they were there when we needed them, but they held off on coming in hard with the proverbial helicopters.聽 They let us make our own mistakes, take a few chances, and maybe even approach that proverbial edge without too much risk of going right over.聽 That鈥檚 not absent parenting, it鈥檚 letting your kids discover their limits so they can learn and make better, more-informed choices tomorrow.

I鈥檓 not a parent, so I know most people reading this will take this column with a grain of salt, but I do know that the protective bubble that too many parents keep wrapped around their kids can have some bad consequences down the road.聽 I鈥檝e seen kids retreat inwards and resent their parents because Mom and Dad were constantly buzzing about and neglected to lengthen the proverbial leash.聽 No one wants that.

While I know the world has always been an unpredictable place regardless of what generation you are, I know that I鈥檓 glad I grew up without Jack and Lynda constantly over my shoulder.

If I ever do have kids of my own one day, they can rest easy knowing I don鈥檛 have a helicopter on standby.

For this week, that鈥檚 been the Ruttle Report.