The Last Rebels: 25 Things We Did as Kids That Would Get Someone Arrested Today
Riding in the back of an open pick-up truck with a bunch of other kids
Leaving the house after breakfast and not returning until the streetlights came on, at which point, you raced home, ASAP so you didn’t get in trouble
Eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches in the school cafeteria
Riding your bike without a helmet
Riding your bike with a buddy on the handlebars, and neither of you wearing helmets
Drinking water from the hose in the yard
Swimming in creeks, rivers, ponds, and lakes (or what they now call *cough* “wild swimming“)
Climbing trees (One park cut the lower branches from a tree on the playground in case some stalwart child dared to climb them)
Having snowball fights (and accidentally hitting someone you shouldn’t)
Sledding without enough protective equipment to play a game in the NFL
Carrying a pocket knife to school (or having a fishing tackle box with sharp things on school property)
Camping
Throwing rocks at snakes in the river
Playing politically incorrect games like Cowboys and Indians
Playing Cops and Robbers with *gasp* toy guns
Pretending to shoot each other with sticks we imagined were guns
Shooting an actual gun or a bow (with *gasp* sharp arrows) at a can on a log, accompanied by our parents who gave us pointers to improve our aim. Heck, there was even a marksmanship club at my high school
Saying the words “gun” or “bang” or “pow pow” (there actually a freakin’ CODE about “playing with invisible guns”)
Working for your pocket money well before your teen years
Taking that money to the store and buying as much penny candy as you could afford, then eating it in one sitting
Eating pop rocks candy and drinking soda, just to prove we were exempt from that urban legend that said our stomachs would explode
Getting so dirty that your mom washed you off with the hose in the yard before letting you come into the house to have a shower
Writing lines for being a jerk at school, either on the board or on paper
Playing “dangerous” games like dodgeball, kickball, tag, whiffle ball, and red rover (The Health Department of New York issued a warning about the “significant risk of injury” from these games)
Walking to school alone
