Retrospect: young guts

Self-tutoring about ways of the past: the tutor mentions a reminder.

When I was a kid, I would often run across four lanes of traffic (when no cars were coming) in order to take a shortcut rather than walking to the corner. I haven’t done so in decades, but it used to be my habit. It wasn’t smart, but I was young and confident.

Today, I was walking home. A hundred metres in front of me, two kids – maybe grades 4 or 5 – were walking the same direction. I needed to cross the road, eventually; their body language suggested to me they didn’t.

Unbeknownst to me, those two kids were checking, furtively, for chances to cross the road. Suddenly, they bolted – across four lanes of traffic. They ran like rabbits, and made it. They reminded me of myself at that age.

I wouldn’t have taken those kids for the risk-taking kind, but maybe I forget that a lot of kids are.