We have been taking a lot of family walks lately. We say it is in preparation for Disneyland, but really, it is just walk and talk time, family time, moving time, playing time and getting to know you time. On one of these walks we found a future housing development. The land has been razed, the sidewalks all are poured, but the fields remain grassy and the cul-de-sac empty. We started riding our bikes over there to play.

See, recently I have realized that our kids won’t be getting that whole “cut them loose” experience like I have. And if it does happen, my kids will be waiting a few more years before I let them head over to the vacant lot to play. But there are no rules at a vacant lot. You can ride circle incessantly in the cul-de-sac without irritating ANY crotchety neighbors. You can whack grass and branches with a stick – no one will yell at you because nobody planted them and anything that gets destroyed will grow back. Wild plants are like that.

Our kids picked the salmon berries at the vacant lot, marveling that such a bounty exists for the birds and the people in nature. They set about moving a felled tree, for whatever reason. I suppose it was simply because they could. Bradley and I sat back and watched as the vacant lot turned from a tickly, itchy, grassy field to a place where there were no boundaries. We sat on the curb of the cul-de-sac and let our kids have as much of a free-range childhood of moving logs, hollering, picking weeds and rolling in the grass as possible.

Gigi asks daily if we can go back to the vacant lot. It’s funny how we, as parents, think we have to offer our kids expensive day trips and gifts when, given the time and opportunity, they are just as happy with a stick machete, berrying and a big log to move. Yet we all know it, we all know the value because when we reflect on our own childhoods, one of the things I treasure most was the unencumbered free play time in wild spaces where kids rules reigned supreme. So yeah, we will be back again and again until the lot is no longer vacant.


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