Costs

Danielle Meitiv's comment hits close to home: "CPS has finally succeeded in making me terrified to let my kids out unsupervised," she says. "I'm afraid they're going to take them away." That's a lot like what I said in 2008: that the neighbor who reported me to CPS had sparked a series of events that my kids all found far more stressful than being told to walk home alone.

What happens with the Meitivs' kids remains to be seen. For my own part, I get weary of pushing back. Do you remember last fall, when the soccer coach didn't want Pete to walk home from practice? We haven't fought that battle this season. Some of it was that he needed someone to walk him through the route a time or two, because it's not a park we visit much these days. But really, it was mostly about the grownups. Having my judgment repeatedly questioned is frustrating, and wearying, and...it's easier just to jump in the car. 

I am typing that and thinking, "What a horrible defeatist attitude! Aren't you supposed to be pushing back?" But here's the reality: sometimes it's hard to be the only kid who's walking home. Sometimes it's hard to be that kid's parent. Sometimes there is only so much space in my head.

I left a comment on a Facebook post about the Meitivs, challenging a commenter who said she had no sympathy at all for them. Six-plus hours of needless worry, hungry kids, frantic parents -- but nobody in that scenario deserves sympathy. They should have listened to the authorities, you know.

Meanwhile my 6-year-old and my 10-year-old walk themselves to and from school every day, almost always unaccompanied by an adult. Sometimes when I imagine someone reporting me for negligence based on that decision I think, "Go ahead. Bring it." Mostly, though, I think, "Please don't. Just don't, okay?"