Sometimes, There's Places I Don't Miss

If you build it, they will come.

The kids built it, and just like that Iowa cornfield, they certainly came.

Sad.

I read the New York Times quite a bit to get a taste of the news from back home. Now, this sort of thing wouldn't happen in the specific town I live in or its surrounding towns (they're actually fairly liberal and this sort of issue could be resolved with a chat in the town administrators' offices). I love baseball; I've said that before. So when I read something like this, it is infuriating. Parents have a knack for screwing up a good thing; this is greatly magnified by the fact that this dispute occurred amongst the uptight, antidepressant-popping control freak adult citizens of Greenwich, Connecticut.

The question: would Northwest parents have the sheer arrogance to repeat something like this, or would stopping kids from having their fun cause them to think twice?

There are plenty of good, legitimate times for parental interjection. Drugs, unacceptable public behavior, teaching responsibility, and so on.

But I often wonder what it might have been like in the times where parenting meant giving your kids room to grow on their own. That era is long forgotten. It is this sort of story I will remember when I have decisions to make about future children of my own.

Current parents, ask yourselves: How did it get to this? Have we failed our children?

Someday, I'll be a parent too. If they build it, let them come. Maybe a little bit of the magic from that Iowa cornfield will rub off on them, too.