I'm collecting your stories today.
My colleagues and I were talking at lunch yesterday about places where we used to play that our parents probably would not have approved of.
When I was a kid in rural Wisconsin, there was a big lot full of large farm implements, which we called the Machinery Lot. It belonged to the local dealer, who also rented out large machines to farmers who only needed them for short periods of the year.
So, behind my mother's back, we climbed up and slid down in the gravity boxes, scaled the hay wagons, ripped our pants open on the manure spreaders, and crawled onto the combines. No kid these days would be allowed to go near a place like that. Which is a bummer, kind of.
How about you? Where did you go to play when you were a kid?
10 comments:
i was just a nerd playing computer games all the time at home. my parents actually had to encourage me to go out. and im not talking about those complex games kids (and i still) play nowadays. they were the times when humans were represented by cubical shapes in a game. :)
Great post!
Sounds like you had fun!
There is a field at the bottom of my parents road, which I was banned from entering, due to the threat of nasty men lurking about.
Of course my friend and I took absolutely no notice of this ban and we regularly sat in the field, munching our way through bags of sweets and telling ghost stories until we had freaked each other out.
There was an abandoned old feed mill by our house and with many, many warnings from our parents not to go there, we did. We had the best times in that place playing everything from "store to hide and go seek. When the building became such a hazard, the village condemned it and would chase us out when they saw our bikes parked in front.
What rural fun you all have had! As a mom, I would love my kids to have a field to play in.
Personally, I didn't play anywhere my parents didn't approve of. They always knew where I was when I went out to play.
pretty safe places. Garden, neighbour 's homes and neighbourhood lanes.
I used to love playing in the graveyard. We would ride bikes over there, and you could ride really fast in a giant oval around the place. Not many people were there and it was very spooky.
My dad & grandpa ran a lumber yard/feed & seed/hardware business.
Together with my brothers & sisters, we used to play tag in the feed & seed warehouse. Sometimes, we'd have races pushing each other on the hand carts that dad used to move bags of feed around.
Other days, we'd jump around and climb between stacks of lumber that grandpa stored in the yard to dry for a year. Everytime I stroll past the lumber section of our local Home Depot, the smell of fresh wood instantly takes me back.
I remember countless lazy summer afternoons stacking stones across the Bell Fountain creek "building our dam" with the boys I hung out with, or playing cops & robbers chasing each other around town on our bikes hootin' and hollerin' as kids do.
I remember how my grandpa would stand propped up in the doorway of the feed warehouse at the end of the day; hand loosely slung through his belt, the "end of day" cigarette in his mouth, eyes gazing off towards the west watching the sun go down.
Those were good times to be a kid.
John
There were some train tracks at the end of our dead end street. A little ways down the train tracks, there was a trestle. My sister and I weren't supposed to go on the tracks or anywhere near the trestle, but we did. There were no siderails on the trestle, and there were gaping holes between each of the cross ties. But we crossed that trestle more times than I can count. :) We also played in the little creek that ran beneath it.
Good question!
We had a huge set of garages, four of them hooked together on our farm. They were ancient and we would climb up on the tar roof to play on them when our parents were gone. We even had a dance recital for each other on there...
I shudder to think of what could have happened...if one of us had fallen through the roof!
I wish I had a cool place like that, but the only thing I can think of that remotely comes close is roping a donkey and "skiing" around the corral.
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