No Strings attached.
5 Years old is a bad time to “Go a wanderin”. Carolyn Claypool and Michael Owens were best of friends and the youngest siblings of brothers 6 years older and sisters more than 10 years older.
They stayed in the yard, and went next door to see each other as often as they could.
One Saturday they found themselves stuck in the yard playing with each other and having nothing more to do than stare out as their sisters and brothers wandered off in every direction one group going to the river group going to the park. They decided on that day that there were things to learn and things to see and they rode off on their bicycles to find out what else the world had to offer, they were five.
Carolyn’s mother’s name was Betty. Betty was a leader of the local women’s club. She was known to all in this small town of Blythe. In high school her best friend was Evelyn . Evelyn married a man named Bill. Bill bought the house next door to Jim. Betty and Evelyn were still best friends.
It was 1969 in the world was just learning to absorb the ideas of being a parent from Dr. Spock.
This Doctor Spock was looking at the world from a different point of view. He thought that if your child had stolen thing from a store, the appropriate reaction was not to punish them but instead to buy him that thing and evaluate to turn it into something that didn’t matter to make it into a thing that wasn’t worth stealing in the first place and thus teaching them that to steal anything was not worth it because whatever it is you want, you can obtain by simply asking your parents.
Giving your kids space was a new thing. Not paying constant attention to them wasn’t that uncommon in that era there were very few child pornographers, child thefts, child rapists, all of the bad things that we experience today with children in the real world were not evident in that world, so parents paid a little less attention to their youngsters as they went off and learned to function in the real world.
Carolyn and Michael both climbed onto their bikes and headed south down the street they lived on. When they reached the first corner, they had a decision to make straight left or right. They chose left. They rode down the boulevard that had no sidewalk on either side on their bicycles both with training wheels and stayed steady due east for at least 4 miles. At the end of this street where the ride ended and the adventure began, they were at the park at the center of town. They ditched their bikes and headed into the park.
This was the largest park in town and had four baseball fields six basketball courts for different sets of gym equipment one in each corner sandboxes climbing walls all of which meant to interest the minds of young people.
Michael and Carolyn played in that park for six hours as their parents panicked desperately for them all over town. The police were called, relatives were called, everyone became involved in the process of finding Carolyn and Mike.
Ultimately they were found, peacefully and playing in the park oblivious to the panic unaware that they had done anything wrong.
Upon their return to home they were both confused by the anger fear and panic both mothers were expressing at the disappearance of their children.
Dr. Spock advised that if a child were to wonder too far away from the safe boundaries defined by the parents, the smart thing to do would be to find a more narrow boundary for that child to operate in and do so by tying them to a tree or some stationary object so that they would be able to understand that the opposite of confining themselves to those boundaries defined by the parents was to lose the distance of even those boundaries to something far less.
Both parents agreed they would exercise this.
Evelyn heard Carolyn crying from over the fence. Michael was crying as well but not as bad. The rope was tied to the tree and 15 feet away from the tree, a harness was fashioned, going around his waist over his shoulders and restraining him to that 15 foot boundary in the perimeter of the tree. Any laps around the tree shortened that distance by 2 feet and of course was elongated by the same 2 feet in a counterclockwise lap. He treated it like it was a fun thing to do. Until it wasn’t.
The wailing from Carolyn grew louder and louder until Evelyn decided the best course of action was to go next door and investigate.
Where Michael had a 15 foot diameter that he could circle around in, Carolyn was lashed to the tree like being burned at the stake.
It is possible Mrs. Claypool misunderstood what Dr. Spock was suggesting, but also possible that being the harshest mom on the street she fully intended to make a lasting impression.
I am only certain of one aspect of this story.
The lashing of the girl to the tree was most likely not what the good doctor was suggesting.
Maybe one other thing.
Dr. Spock was probably an idiot.
