Moms and the Schoolbus

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
41

MBG, I’m building a shrine to you.

I always took the bus and my mom never waited at the end of the driveway with me. I lived less than a mile from the elementary school, but there was/is a super-dangerous intersection one house over from where I lived so the bus that passed my house picked me up on the way back to the school. I walked home from middle school after we moved into town and I lived six blocks away. I rode the bus and got rides from friends in high school. The only time my parents got involved at all was if I missed the bus.

Do these hovering parents have jobs? My folks had to be out the door a few minutes before/after I did to get to work on time.

42

When I transferred to a school to which I had to be bussed, my first bus stop was about 3 blocks over, in front of my old school. By the time my bus dropped me off, the crossing guard was gone for the day, and I had to cross a high traffic street with no stoplight. It was a learning experience.

Later, my stop got moved to some random street corner a few blocks down. Once when I got off the bus a car exploded about a block over. It was awesome. Less awesome was That House I had to walk past. That House had a giant scary attack dog with dripping fangs and foaming rage that barked loudly and always tried to ram the weak and decrepit fence. One day it broke loose and chased me until some guy across the street yelled at it to get lost. It was horrifying and traumatic and I was a nervous wreck that year from worrying about walking past that house.

I still would not want my parents to walk with me.

43

I still walk to the bus stop with Whatsit Jr. who is in first grade, but this is more to ensure that Whatsit Jr., who is, shall we say, easily distracted, actually gets on the dang bus, and not really out of any concern for predators or whatever. Next year I think I’ll let him go it alone. The bus stop is only about a block from our house, anyway.

(And as others have mentioned, really I kind of enjoy the socialization with the other parents at the bus stop in the morning.)

44

This is how kids get fat. Dangerosa’s story about the SUV driving back a block or whatever makes me ill. We keep yakking about making the schools feed them better or whatever when in reality we should just throw them out in the yard to play every day, like our parents did. Be it apartments, houses, or whatever, I found a place to play and kids to play with. Parents had to drag me back inside at dark.

45

This was what I was thinking, too. I can’t imagine the mentality that allows an able-bodied person to refuse to walk the, what, 30 feet from their house to the end of their driveway to get on the bus and the parents’ willingness to condone it. I mean, what the hell?

I was also one of those kids who walked to school alone or with kids my age and, when school was out, left home early in the morning, showed up for lunch sometimes (if I wasn’t going to, I’d call) and stayed out until dark playing basketball or running footraces or collecting snails with friends in my neighborhood. Complaining that there was “nothing to do” was a surefire way to get my mom to assign me chores inside, so I spent as much time playing outside as humanly possible.

And given my experience with my toddler and my friends’ kids, most children want to move around - a lot, which leads me to think that sedentariness to that degree is more an acquired behavior rather than innate (though, this being the Dope, I’ll add the disclaimer that I get that kids vary greatly, with some being less energetic than others).

46

OK, am I the only perv who saw the thread title and thought “bow chicka wow”…

:o

47

I’ve seen a similar vehicular bus stop situation. On my commute I would regularly see an SUV sitting at the end of a well-off street in any and all weather, including beautiful, warm, sunny fall mornings. The sort of mornings that I loved growing up, crunching as many leaves as possible on my solitary jaunt two blocks up the road to the bus stop.
When I had the misfortune to wind up behind the school bus, I’d witness:
Bus stops. Vehicle door opens. Two kids hop out. Kids are well on their way to teenagerhood. Oops! Junior forgot his backpack! Hop back in the SUV, get back pack. Hop out. What’s that, Mom? I can’t hear you. Hop back in, talk to mom, hop back out. Trudge across street. Board bus.
As children are boarding bus, SUV backs 30yrds up the street and into driveway.
:rolleyes:

48

I started walking to school – 1 mile – when I was in kindergarten. I walked with my neighbor, who was also in kindergarten. Our moms (who were both stay-at-home-moms) walked us the whole way the first couple of weeks, and then started letting us go the last bit on our own, then the last 2 turns, then the last 3, etc. until we were walking the whole way by ourselves. We did this all the way through elementary school (well, we started riding our bikes when we were old enough, and meeting up with classmates). We walked to Jr. High. The only times our parents drove us was when we had something big to carry (band instruments did not count) or if it was really pouring down rain.

I’m only 30, so it’s not like this is back in the 1940s or whatever. And this was in Silicon Valley – not the boonies.

I could understand parents meeting up at the bus stop to chat, and I can understand the appeal of having a nice quiet walk with your child – time to connect and all. And I don’t have experience with this as an adult, since I only have a 1-year-old. But I do not see the point or the need for driving your child less than about a half-mile (unless there is some dangerous road, or you’re running late, or there is some other mitigating factor). I mean, 2 houses? Puh-lease.

49

My husband is disabled and can’t drive. He can’t walk very far, and my daughter is in kindergarten. The school requires that kindergartners have a parent present for pickup and drop off, so we arranged with the school for the bus to stop in front of our house. I assumed that next year we would let her go to the stop at the end of the block despite there being no sidewalks, but something happened to make me very wary of this.

A neighbor girl two or three years older than my daughter was playing with her in our yard and tried to make her “show” her “pee” to her. She said this while pointing at her crotch. Now this neighbor girl has a past of trying to coerce my daughter into doing things she should not or doesn’t want to do. We have let our daughter know that she is responsible for her own behavior, and doesn’t have to do what this girl tells her. There have been a few groundings and such (just because she tells you to jump on the roof of the car doesn’t make it ok, you have to face the consequences of your own actions), and I thought that they were playing nicer together. Then this happens.

My daughter stormed inside angry as and told my husband what happened. He called her father and told him. The father said that she is going to counseling already due to other things in their life and that he would tell the counselor so they can work on it, and thanked us for taking this up with him first. My daughter was still as angry as I have seen her when I got home and still doesn’t want to play with this girl (which makes it nice that we don’t have to forbid it).

So, next year, do I let my daughter wait unsupervised at a stop with this girl that is far out of our sight? Do I try to continue to get the bus to stop in front of our house?

50

Yes, you do. Explain the situation just like you did here, and get the Principal involved. He’ll back up that the other girl has behavior issues (he won’t tell you because of privacy issues) but he will likely call your Local Bus Guy and see what can be arranged.

51

The school is aware of this girl having issues, and the counselling is through the school. I believe that someone at the school is aware of this issue. I am not entirely sure because my husband is the one talking to the neighbor and school.

I do want everyone to realize that not all protection of children is overprotection. It is sometimes hard to see the issues that trigger the response. I want my daughter to be independent, but I need to balance that with reasonable caution.

52

I went to a PTO meeting the other night and had to hear this mom whine about how her kindergartener has to walk .8 of a mile to and from school. I agree with this, but she lost me when she whined about her son having to walk past houses when she doesn’t know who lives there. :rolleyes:

Because, y’know, the world is just crawling with pedophiles.

Robin

53

Why doesn’t she, god forbid, drag her ass over there and TALK to them! Is it so bad to say, “My kid is walking past on this path every day.”? She doesn’t have to say she’s afraid of them, or even tell them to watch out for the kid. She could just say “I wanted you to know so you wouldn’t think there was just a random kid wandering aronud.”

54

In this case, these are my neighbors…my kids play with these kids. There are no “scary pedophiles” or kids likely to push drugs at the bus stop in the neighborhood - or at least there is no more risk of that than anywhere else.

I can completely understand standing by your kids when the bus stop is in front of the “weird guys” house, or the “suspected crack house” - that isn’t the case here.

55

In this case, these are my neighbors…my kids play with these kids. There are no “scary pedophiles” or kids likely to push drugs at the bus stop in the neighborhood - or at least there is no more risk of that than anywhere else.

I can completely understand standing by your kids when the bus stop is in front of the “weird guys” house, or the “suspected crack house” - that isn’t the case here.

56

Hmmm. I guess I didn’t know that kids didn’t have their parents wait with them at the bus stop in elementary school. My mom always waited with me and my bus stopped at the end of my driveway! I do have to say, though, that I LOVED the time my mom and I hung out while waiting for the bus. It was the one time of day I was guaranteed her undivided attention (baby brother took up her time otherwise). The only request I had was that she stop making faces back at the boys who made faces at her. (Yeah, I had big boys with beards, guns, and whiskey on my bus too, TheLoadedDog.) Mom did not wait for the bus to drop me off in the afternoon.

When I started 3rd grade she started working at the school, and so my bussing days were behind me until middle school. And no, she didn’t wait with me then.

57

Reading through this thread has gotten me to wondering where all the schoolchildren have gone. I know the world has changed since I was young and walked to school back in the 1960’s, but where I live, children have just about vanished.

When I walked to school (1961-1965), it was about a half mile each way (only part way uphill, one way), and many kids walked a little farther. About half way, there was a large drainage ditch, and a wooden bridge was built over the ditch for the kids to cross over on. This bridge was blocked off a few years ago due to its age, and this year it was finally torn down after over forty years.
I wondered, how are the kids going to get across the drainage area now? They would have to walk twice as far, through heavier traffic, to get to school now.

Then it occured to me - there was no longer any need for the bridge because kids didn’t walk to the school any more.

I now live just outside of town, where the neighborhoods are very much like a suburb area, but a little more rural. Due to the growth in the area the last few years, a new elementary school was built in one of the new subdivisions. There are not a lot of houses in the new subdivision, but quite a few more across the one main road that runs between the two areas.

When I heard about the school being built, I wondered how all the kids from the other side of the road were going to get back and forth. They were all so close that there would be no bus service, and they would have to walk, but there were no sidewalks, no crossings, no intersections with lights or stop signs - nothing. I expected some sort of crossing to be put in, perhaps a “mama patrol” to stop the cars and let the kids across the road, something to make it safe for the kids to walk to school - but nothing. The speed limit on the main road is 45 mph, but hardly anybody goes that slow.

Wasn’t anything needed. Although I don’t always drive by when kids would be expected to be walking back and forth between home and school, there isn’t any need for a crossing because I have never seen one single kid walking to school. Not one.

I figured that a traffic light was inevitable at the place where the single road into this subdivision hits the main road, because I expected there to be a lot more traffic from all the moms dropping off and picking up their kids at school, but I see no more traffic than before. About half the time I go past this street, there is no traffic going in or out, as if few families lived down that way.

Where are all the kids that go to this new school? How are they getting there? Do they all have underground tunnels to their individual houses? Now, I don’t wait around the schoolgrounds, watching the kids - that would get me in trouble, no doubt - but you would think I would occasionally see at least one single kid walking or riding a bike somewhere along the way.

And I realize that kids nowadays spend a lot of time inside playing video games and time on the phone and internet, but I never see any neighborhood kids outside playing anymore. No kids riding bikes, playing ball, playing with friends in the yard - nothing. The only kids I ever hear or see outside are the ones visiting on the weekends, when it’s mom or dads time with them. Other than that, you wouldn’t know there were any kids living out here.

To somebody who spent a great deal of their youth outside, playing with friends and family, or doing things all on my own, it seems kind of spooky not seeing any kids around.

58

The parents who stand with their kids at the bus stop also tend to be the parents who won’t let their kids play in a fenced yard by themselves or ride a bike farther than the end of the block. Then they call the school and complain that PE is only once a week and how is Pweshious supposed to stay healthy without school sponsored structured play?

I’m also not a bus stop monitor. My kids go three whole blocks to the bus stop and stand on the corner of a highway without the benefit of a sidewalk. I’ve never seen a parent at the bus stop with the kids. There are enough kids to watch out for each other and there’s a sign on the highway warning the community that the stop exists. That’s enough for me.

59

Every bus stop I pass in the morning has at least three parents waiting with their children. Some in cars, some not. This is Florida mind you.

I can’t say anything about it since I drive my child the 5 miles to school since her private school doesn’t offer bussing. I do know her friend that lives across the street gets driven to the stop a block away each morning by her grandmother. I would imagine if my daughter went to the same school, I would send my kid with her granny too.

60

I guess I’ll offer myself up as one of the (former) kids whose parents saw perverts in everything. My mother wouldn’t let me walk to school when it was just a couple of blocks away, in either elementary or high school when we lived in Dallas. Although I routinely came home during P.E. my freshman year, because the freakin’ gym almost touched our backyard. But still, you just never knew who might be lurking about on a Monday morning at 7:30 AM.

When we moved to east Texas sometime after my fourteenth birthday, things didn’t improve. She still continued to drop me off and pick me up every single day until I was old enough to drive myself (and then occasionally too, until I had a car of my own – which, sadly, didn’t really take place until I was a senior) and if you don’t think that’s embarrassing enough on its own, consider we lived in a community where it was routine for junior high kids to take the family vehicle to the store. So, I had that brunt to bear along with her refusing to ever let me spend the night away from home (not even with relatives!) or go out on (single) dates with anyone she didn’t threaten first (along the lines of, “Not even the sun better come up between you…”), around graduation time.

And I was a hyper-fundamentalist kid who wouldn’t have ever dreamed of even telling her white lie, so all this was really unnecessary in the first place and pointless in the second because she’s never known anyone who has been abused anyway.

Sorry for the rant. Now y’all know how some of us feel who were forced into it and hated it (now and then) every step of the way.