Last weekend was hot and muggy and we decided what better time to have two other families over to our small house to BBQ and to hang out. We filled the kiddie pool, I loaded up the cooler with sparkling water and beer, bought a bunch of hamburgers for the grill. We were all set.
There were six kids ranging from age three up to about 11. We, the parents, finally convinced them to go in the back yard and play with the Franklin bat and ball. It was going to be adult time on the front driveway with no kids bugging us for just a few minutes.
But sure enough the tweenage kid knocks the ball into our back neighbor's yard and the way I know this is because we all took note of the silence coming from back there. Parents know that when things in the other room, or other yard, fall silent you better go check it out... because something is up.
So me and another dad walk into the back yard and wouldn't you know it the kids were having a mini-debate straight out of the movie Sandlot. No one wanted to go into our neighbor Paul's backyard because they were afraid of him. I have no idea why, Paul has never done or said anything mean or angry to my kids before. I think they were psyching each other out.
Finally the kid who hit the ball volunteered to retrieve it. He climbed through the hole we cut in our fence last summer (now that's another long story for another time) and went to find where the ball landed. And... wouldn't you know it? Paul starts yelling at the kid through his kitchen window, "Hey, get outta my yard what the heck are you doing here?!"
Freaked the kid out.
He got the ball back and ran back into our yard. Paul came out of his house and saw me standing on my hill and apologized for yelling, he was startled by the sight of an unknown kid in his backyard, but you know what? When I grew up everyone's yard was our back yard. Our baseball games ranged several blocks in length and games of Cowboys and Indians (that's what it was called back then) involved running skirmishes that spread across the county (in our mind's eye of course).
Fences. Them's the culprits. It's when we started building fences saying this stuff is mine and that stuff is yours... that's when we started losing what neighborhood is all about.
Ok, there you go.
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