What is the naughiest thing you did as a child?

[elf69]

I'm only 33 so not that long ago I was a kid.
I was "free range" kid.

me and my mates would ride our bikes every where.
There was about 10 of us. We used to jump on bike in summer holidays at like 10 in morning and not come back til 8-9 at night.
parents never said word.

I was a good kid and never got in trouble.

My brother (two years younger than me) well lets just say he seen back of police car a few times too many.
Nothing major or real bad but he soon stopped doing what ever it was he was doing.
He has ADHD so we think that was a factor. Since he too has one little boy and another baby on way he has calmed down somewhat.

 

[Mousse]

When I say old days , I mean really old days, like 50 years ago.

Back when, if you got hurt playing "King of the Hill" on a pile of gravel on a vacant lot, Mom pulled out a bottle of iodine followed by a spanking for trespassing. I swear, the iodine hurts 100x more than the spanking.

Today it's a trip to the emergency room, followed by 10 days of antibiotics. And if Mom is in a bad mood, a call to the lawyer to sue the construction company for leaving a pile of gravel where it can be a threat to her precious baby boy.

 

[mscriv]

Daring! I fantasized about jumping on a moving train and taking a ride, but never did.

Great thread, and lovely thread title.

Actually, reading it, I'm very struck by the number of comments which mention the joys and pure pleasure of unfettered free roaming childhoods. (And @mscriv, riding the tops of trains......allow me a moment's undisguised envy..)

In all honesty, it was quite grand. The crazy thing is my friend and I were really young and stupid. We were playing in a large train yard with multiple tracks and in genuine immature fashion we did not realize the risks we were taking in jumping between moving trains, still trains, and from boxcar to boxcar. A fall from either of us could have easily resulted in death or serious lifelong injury.

And - I am equally struck by the remarks which follow - on the lines of watching your own kids "like hawks" - as both @mscriv and @Huntn have written.

Is there such a thing as over-protectiveness, or how does one encourage a sense of adventure, of controlled risk, of encouraging a degree of physical independence, of understanding, mastering and applying the concept of "risk assessment", of wanting to test yourself - and test boundaries - without parental supervision?

As a child I was free of supervision routinely. As early as age 11 or 12 my parents would allow me to roam the neighborhood with peers or by myself. It was not unheard of for me to wake up on Saturday morning before my parents and "go out to play" with friends and not return for hours if not the whole day.

With that kind of upbringing I am more apt to allow my own boys a measure of freedom and I agree that children need to opportunity for independence, but as a whole American culture seems to have really tightened up in this area. In my current neighborhood I would not be comfortable giving my children the same freedom that I had as a child. I think we certainly need to be taking some steps in this area and I want my wife and I to start doing that soon.