J and C and Me

When did people stop giving a crap about other people?  Especially kids?

I’ve noticed a few times in the past year that occasionally, in the afternoon, a random pack of kids will drift down the street.  In the middle of the school day.

Now there are lots of reasons for them to be there I guess….but the most plausible in my eyes is that they are cutting class.  I do live about half a block from a middle school.

Now, I know the school’s schedule (because the follow the same one as Jordan).  I know they have a closed campus.  This pretty much leaves the homeschooling option as the only other one….and it just doesn’t seem likely to me.  I mean, do homeschooled kids get to wander in packs through town in the afternoon?  Most I know are doing some sort of school, you know, at home.

Well now that’s I’m all loving my Lexapro and coming out of my selfish depression, I’m starting to notice the world around me.  So when the pack of kids came down the street yesterday, it started to bother me.

Okay, these kids ought to be in school, but they are cutting.  Does anyone know?  Does anyone care?  Am I supposed to do something about it?  What exactly am I supposed to do.

So I did what I always do when encountered with a decision I am perplexed by…..I surveyed the moms on the BabyCenter Bargain Board.  Oh yeah.  I’m pathetic like that.  I’m a stay at home mom, it’s not like I’m winning any popularity contest over here.

Anyway, I was shocked….simply shocked by the about of people who responded “Mind your own business”.  They aren’t your kids, they aren’t your problem.  Leave them alone.

Wha huh?  These are kids we’re talking about here!  We’re faced with an epidemic of young people who are floundering.  Eleven year old girls who end up pregnant, thirteen year olds in rehab.  I’m not worried about some troublesome kids kicking over my flowers here…..I’m worried about the future of these CHILDREN who ought to be in school.  They ought to be in school learning about how to survive and perform some marketable task in the real world.  At the very least, they ought to be supervised!

See, there’s a reason that we don’t let kids drive, or vote, or do many other things.  They are not capable of making responsible decisions regarding their future.  Even the most responsible adolescent does something patently stupid at some point in time.  They think they are invincible, immortal, that death, disease, or failure can not touch them.

Then I get the whole “you can’t make kids go to school”.  What?  Actually, yes, yes you can.  There is a county truant officer.  If the school is responsible enough to report truancy, the officer will visit the child’s home.  He will speak with the parents.  And he will explain to the parents that unless the see to it that their child attends school, they (the parents) will face jail time.  In most cases, the parent wants no part of jail time and sees that the child goes to school.  Honestly….it usually doesn’t ever have to go that far.  Most parents are oblivious that kids skip school.  They ride the bus to school, go to home room, get counted present, skip out, then catch the bus at the end of the day.

Even if a kid doesn’t have parents that care….isn’t that what teachers and school administrators are for?  Kids need to be in school whether they like it or not.  Yes, there is some part of it that lies in making school fun for the kids.  But everyone is so into that they are forgetting that kids need to be present even when school is not fun.  School did not used to be fun.  And kids went every day.

Oh, and then there’s the whole “but I skipped school and I turned out just fine”  Right.  How much school was skipped.  I think I skipped school a handful of times.  My mom found out once and grounded me for what seemed like forever.  As she right well should have!  This was in high school, by the way, not middle school.  And what did my friends and I do on those days that school was skipped.  Well, I did a bunch of nothing.  They smoked (and sometimes drank) as much as they possibly could.  Lucky for me, I already had a good touch of  “don’t go with the flow” in me and the more peer pressure they put on me to do those things….the less I wanted to do them.

Unfortunately, kids don’t just smoke cigarettes or drink when the skip school anymore.  Sure, neither of those are good things….but for the most part they won’t kill you in an afternoon.  Some of the other stuff that kids get their hands on now….well, I can’t say the same about it.

Alright, so am I that far off base?  Do we really have no social responsibility?  Should I just let these kids go about their business, or the next time they go past my house….should I maybe ask them where they are going…and maybe contact the school about it?

Beware, I’m on fire this week.  More rants may be coming.  They won’t be this long though, because in the time it took me to get this all typed I had to stop a hundred million times to put someone down for nap, to interrupt the nap to pick up the kid who missed the bus, to take someone potty, to clean up the pee that got on the floor when i didn’t drop what I was doing to get her to the potty fast enough, and to cook dinner.