Risky...

Just the other day, my middle one and I were out and about discussing all matter of things when she mentioned how having not been overly exposed to taking risks as a child has made it a bit difficult to put herself out there as an adult. I had to apologize. I was a daring youngin' and I told her about the things I'd done:

Scaling the side of my elementary school building up to my first grade classroom because the doors were locked (the school year had ended) and I just knew my teacher Mrs. Buckinger was up there doing what teachers do once the instruction year was over. I did make it up there! My error was letting go with one hand to wave at my teacher which caused a meeting with the ground that was not in my itinerary. Did I learn anything? Yes - to not let go and wave. Up again I went; fall again I did. I did this three times and it is true that three times is a charm because that's how many times it took for me to severely sprain my right wrist making another climb impossible.

Another crazy thing was climbing on the roof of Cathy's house; walking the wood fence to the trees at the back and literally walk through the trees via the branches. Hey, it was fun and something I recall doing many times without any bodily damage. Had a branch broke while in transit, I would have probably gotten right back up there again. We used to simply climb to the roof and jump off just 'cause it was fun.

We used to walk about two miles (can't believe that's all it is) to Liberty Park down in Renton to go swimming. Down from the library there's a train trellis over the Cedar River that just screamed out to be jumped from! Not that I did it more than one or two times, us kids would go down there all the time and I'd usually just watch mine and Cathy's sibs do all the jumping into the river. Dangerous at best, I know how lucky we were not to have killed ourselves.

We moved from the corner of Thomas and Earlington Ave's at the beginning of my third grade - should give you an indication that I took such risks at a very early age! It's the stupid stuff like that which caused me to be over-protective of my own kids. I wanted them to have fun, sure, just not the ways I did. So yeah, had to apologize to my daughter about having given her a lack of risk taking...I on the other hand am now 50 years old and up for just about any challenge!