[blparent] Introducing Myself and First Question

[Jo Elizabeth Pinto]

It's kind of sad how careful everybody has to be these days.  I remember 
when my brother and sister and I were kids, we'd ride our bikes all over the 
neighborhood.  We were just told to come home when the church bells rang. 
(I had a tandem bike that my brother or sister would pilot.)  Now, nobody 
would dare just turn their kids loose.  I'm sounding like a geezer, so I'll 
shut up, but it's too bad some things have changed.

Jo Elizabeth

Until lions have their historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify 
the hunters.--African Proverb

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From: "Robert Shelton" <rshelton1 at gmail.com>
Sent: Friday, September 11, 2009 8:19 PM
To: "'NFBnet Blind Parents Mailing List'" <blparent at nfbnet.org>
Subject: Re: [blparent] Introducing Myself and First Question

> Walky-talkies...  I remember it well.  In 1979 we lived on the outskirts 
> of Knoxville Tennessee.  The property next door to ours was a couple of 
> hundred acres of woods.  My two oldest boys, 7 and 5 at the time, loved to 
> go hiking off into the woods.  It was a very innocent time and a lovely 
> place, but we wanted to have a way to call them home.  I researched it 
> carefully.  We got some inexpensive walky-talkies from a toy store, and I 
> even went so far as to take one into the woods all the way to the top of 
> the ridge and on to the other side where there was a clearing.  Walking in 
> a forest requires a whole different set of cane travel and navigation 
> skills, but that's another story.  Anyway, everything worked fine -- great 
> reception everywhere.  It was fool-proof.
>
> So, came the day my boys went off by themselves on their nature hike. 
> Everything was going great -- Mom: "Breaker 19 ... you boys doin' OK?"
> Boys: "Yeah Mom, we found the neatest flower..."
> Thirty minutes pass...
> Mom: "Breaker 19... what's your 20?"
>
> Dead silence.  Progressively greater panic sets in.  I know the area 
> pretty well, so I'm just taking off to find them when I hear a rustle and 
> little voices.  They were fine, and hungry, but they got tired of the 
> static noise from the walky-talkies and just turned them off.
>
> I think modern ones can be set up to ring when you call, so you probably 
> won't have the same problem, but that's one of my favorite memories.  Now 
> we live in Houston -- no small kids, but here people don't let their kids 
> out of their yard, I guess for good reason.
>