Christopher Null

I love this story — both that the woman in question had the guts to let her kid do something on his own, but also the indignation with which the public responded to it. Seriously, she’s his mom, so she gets to decide when the kid is old enough to ride the bus alone.

At the same time, we wrestle in our house with the same topic: Our daughter is six. How old should she be before she walks to the corner store (crossing only one major street to get there) on her own? How long until she rides the subway or bus alone? I grew up in the suburbs and can’t remember when I wasn’t playing unsupervised around the neighborhood, but city life spooks me into conservatism even though I know, statistically, the kid is probably more likely to get hurt playing at home than outside. (As she did 2 weeks ago…)