No. 9: Walking my daughter to school.... not any more

As I wrote in my last post here, it was all whirlwind, heat and flash. Within an hour the parents were made to stay at home and the daughter hit the road to school on her own.

What I mean to say is that my wife was late taking our daughter to school one day and in a minute she decided that our daughter would go to school on her own starting the next day. My daughter was perfect with that.   I,  was not.  In fact the next day I did go with her as she was late in getting off and I said you cant go by yourself when you are late.  Because I KNOW how to get there on time when we are running late.  She does not.

Look how awful that grey car is driving crossing the line

But the point being that now she would be going to school on her own.  I lost out on that argument.  I thought that in this post Etan Patz world, I think it is better if girls are in 4th or 5th grade or 10 years old when they start going to school by themselves.  My daughter is 8 in the third grade.  And she doesn't go with anyone, just by herself. I don't know if it is a good idea. I just don't know.

We did some test runs at the end of 2016, following 20 yards behind her.  At first she didn't know.  Then she did.  But then we didn't continue with this, with the next step and let her go by herself. I don't know why not.  Until my wife had a fit and decided in early February this year that our daughter would go by herself.

After that next day I went with her I was expecting to go with her also the following day, but as I said in my last post, it didn't work out.  They wouldn't let me.  So I took my coat off which I had thrown on over my Homer Simpson pajamas and went to the window to watch her walk up the street.  We live on the fifth floor and have a little alcove over the street so we can have a nice view all the way up the street.  The problem was that I didn't have time to put on my contact lenses and my glasses are old and my eyes are worse, so I couldn't really see much.  I saw several dots walking up the street and although she has a big red and blue back pack which is nearly as big as she is, I had trouble figuring out which dot was her.  I am looking out the window like a blind mole trying to figure out which moving dot was my daughter, trying to see the people crossing the street at the end of the block.

That just didn't work.

I think that was Wednesday.

By Friday she asked me to walk with her to school and I was relieved and thrilled.  It is kind of boring walking by yourself to school.

On the way home I walked very slowly and looked at all the store fronts and garages and looked for any basement type work shops that mysterious, nefarious men could jump out of to grab her. I recall that Number 9 on that street looked... hauntingly scary.  I repeated it in my head for further investigation one day.  "Number 9 Number 9 Number 9.  You become naked."  Wait a sec, where did that come
from?    I am going to take some pictures of "unsafe" looking doorways to keep on hand, to check out sometime.

Of course I am half joking.  But only half.  The other half I am serious.  I joke on one half of the equation because I find myself acting ridiculously that I have to look for some bogeyman that doesn't exist.  Most of the child nappers, abusers are friends or relatives of the family and are "known people".  This is statistically true.  The smallest percentage of child kidnappers, under 10 per cent if I can give that number without looking it up (in other words, don't take my word for it on that number), are "dark strangers" from the street.

ON THE OTHER HAND, even with the slight possibility, the low percentage that something could happen, I would rather play it safe than sorry of course.  I would rather still walk with my daughter to school, also because its nice to do this, but if she doesn't want me to, at least I can make sure it is a safe journey every day.   I would rather err on the side of safety and caution than be sorry for the rest of my life.

At the time of this writing it is the end of February and slowly I am getting used to sending her off by herself.  I suppose I needed time myself to make that leap of letting my daughter go by herself.  Sometimes I put my contacts on and watch her walk all the way up the street till she is a small red and blue and brown haired dot somewhere at the end of the block.