A Boring Childhood

[fairfarmhand]

My kids say I had the most boring, pathetic childhood ever.

 

They're kinda right. We were poor. Always lived away from our friends in the country. As a pastor's daughter, there were lots of things we didn't do for religious reasons.

 

So, my kids think my childhood was boring.

 

It's almost a family joke about mom's sad childhood.

 

I don't feel sad about it. It was the way it was. No adventures, no traveling. My birthday parties were awful, with no one wanting to make the drive way out to the sticks to where we lived.

 

I spent my childhood reading library books and daydreaming.

 

Anyone else have a boring childhood?

 

At the time I didn't know it was boring!

[Granny_Weatherwax]

I did.  Like you I grew up poor. I grew up in the city, though, and was acutely aware that my upbringing was different than others. I read as an escape from my dreary reality.

 

 

[Squawky Acres]

I think your childhood sounds relaxed and peaceful, with lots of time for reading, daydreaming, and your inner life.  I'm sure you were able to spend a lot of time playing and outdoors -- sheltered from stress and having to grow up too fast.  I have found that young children do not always appreciate adventure and travel as much as we think they might. 

 

I grew up in a rural, middle-class (maybe poor?) family and also had a quiet childhood -- but it was the most perfect childhood ever.  We read all the time, spent a lot of time hiking and outdoors, and only traveled by car to historic sites or to visit family -- no exotic air travel, Disneyland, or beach vacations.  I loved just being left alone with my books and friends and my imagination.  I had a loving family, and I was allowed to be a child.

 

Later, when I lived in NY and had many friends who had grown up in their Park Avenue apartments in the city, a friend was talking about his childhood full of trips to Europe, a house in the Hamptons, trips to FAO Schwartz, yacht clubs, symphony concerts, and black-tie functions.  And then he stopped himself and said that he didn't mean to make me feel bad about my childhood because he knew I didn't have those opportunities.  I was amused by his pity, and said that I was glad he enjoyed growing up in New York, but that I had also had the most glorious childhood myself.  I didn't mention that I secretly pitied the poor kids who had to grow up with all of the stress of wealth and city living, with nannies instead of parents and no back yard . . .

[73349]

Mine was pretty boring. TV on all day, every day; very little by way of activities or social stuff at all. Didn't even go to church.

 

But, you know, I think most people aren't spending their childhoods on sailboats and taking the Grand Tour and co-authoring books with their pen pals from Laos and starting businesses out in the garage.

 

Right now my kid is reading a Judy Blume book, and later we'll meet friends at a park; yesterday we went to the state fair and he had scouts. Nice, but maybe not things he'll remember as super exciting. Except the fair, he'd probably say he'd just as soon watch TV.

[Arcadia]

My hubby has a boring childhood. I told him it’s good that he did not had the experience of witnessing SWAT in action, fatal gang fights with knives and wine bottles, anti-vice raids, anti-narcotics raids. I knew neighbors whose parents are in and out of jail for drugs and gang activities. I have seen newborn babies in my childhood neighborhood with cold turkey (from drugs) syndrome. My ex-colleague from a temp job has a niece and nephew with birth defects directly related to their mom (her drug addict uncle’s wife) consuming street drugs except when she is in jail.

 

Boring is good.

[mykidsrmyjoy]

My husband's childhood was boring. His parents didn't have much of anything except kids . They lived in a rural area, homeschooled, went to church twice a week and traveled once a year or so to visit relatives.

 

They had very few toys, so he spent most of his time after school outside playing with toads and riding his bike.

 

He turned out to be a hard-working, loving, humorous man that is well-liked and respected by just about everyone who knows him. I'm not sure that his boring childhood was such a bad thing.

[KeriJ]

These are good to hear as I am constantly worried that my kids have a boring childhood.

[MotherGoose]

We mostly stayed home. Went to the beach for a few days a few times. I lived on a farm so I spent a lot of time outside. I didn't fly until I was in college and paid for it myself. So I guess mine qualifies as boring. I guess my parents have pretty boring lives too. But they are content. They are in good health and although they aren't wealthy, they have enough money. I had a happy, peaceful childhood. Dh family always went to the beach for a week every year, ate out, shopped, and I think had a fairly exciting childhood. Lots of family drama and divorce. Because his parents never denied themselves things as my parents did, they are now living in poverty, basically. My parents never did things they couldn't pay for. I'm quite sure dh would trade drama for boring any day. At least we are striving for that for our kids.

[Joyofsixreboot]

Yep. Poor-ish, tiny rural town and my parents had a depression childhood so feeding us was a step up from their childhood. I read a lot. I wasn't unhappy but I have made up for it on adulthood.

 

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Edited October 19, 2017 by joyofsix

[mathnerd]

I had a boring childhood. We did not have TV (my parents were anti-TV). I read books all the time.

[Garga]

Gymnastic lessons for a year (6 yo)

Tap dance and ballet lessons for a year (9 yo)

Clarinet lessons for a year or two (10-11 yo)

Piano lessons for 3 years or so (12-14 yo)

 

None of the lessons overlapped.  So about 7 years of my childhood, I had lessons once or twice a week.

 

Church on Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and Thursday evening.

 

School all day.

 

I was in an after school play once. 

 

I was in the school band, so in high school there were some marching band parades I was in.

 

No sports.  No clubs at school.  

 

Before 7th grade was a lot of roller skating and playing outside.  8th grade was a lot of bike riding.  7th and 8th there was wading in a local stream.  

 

I read a ton.  A ton.  I was an only child and if friends weren't available, which they often weren't, then I read.  When they were available we were outside running around and making a lot of noise.

 

I rode a bus to school and spent that time daydreaming out the window.  

 

We lived near a kid with a pool one year and I remember being shivery and blue in that pool for that summer.

 

I went to visit relatives in Colorado once and to California twice for about a week each time.  The relatives visited us and we hit some local tourist places during the week or two they visited (Washington DC for example.)  

 

Even though we lived 2 hours from the beach, I never saw the ocean until I met my DH.  He was astounded that I'd never seen the ocean and took me there soon after we met.  

 

In high school, I had only one friend and once she got her license on her 16th bday, we would hang out at malls or at the movies or at her house a lot.  

 

Before my friend and her car, I spent most evenings with my parents watching tv.

 

 

Really, it was very slow paced and calm.  Lots of quiet time for me to read. I wish my family could have traveled more, but otherwise, it was a good childhood.

Edited October 19, 2017 by Garga

[Liz CA]

Wonderful, peaceful childhood in a small community. Every time I watch Anne of Avonlea I laugh so hard because there are some characters that seem to have been taken straight out of my little town.

I used to spend summers sitting in the cherry trees (dense foliage, good hiding spot) and read book after book. Grandma (who lived next door) would slip me money to buy more books because the next library was far away and not well stocked.

Large garden with lots of vegetables and flowers to grow. Safe streets where we rode bikes, rollerbladed and even played hide and seek simply using neighbors garbage cans and fence posts.

Winters were spend sledding and ice skating on a field that flooded and froze over every year. Parents loved this because there was no danger of anyone breaking through the ice and drowning because it was at the most 2 feet deep.

Traveled a bit as a child and then more when I was a young teen. Visited relatives in another state which was always fun. The drive alone was fascinating to me. Lots of memories were made around the table, and on holidays like Christmas and Easter.

Edited October 19, 2017 by Liz CA

[SamanthaCarter]

I had a less boring childhood than my kids and my adult life. My dad was military so we moved every two years or so and got to see a lot of the US. We were pretty free range, usually no tv and vacations were camping within a day's drive of wherever we lived. Wasn't a privileged childhood, but peaceful and interesting enough.

 

 

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[Catwoman]

My feeling is that if your childhood was happy, who cares if other people would have thought it was boring? And likewise, even if you had the most exciting childhood imaginable, if you weren't happy, what good was it?

[SparklyUnicorn]

very boring

 

happy?  no, not really

 

It is what it is.

 

 

[Elizabeth86]

I guess many would say it was boring, but it was very happy. I like boring. i don't like excitement, I was content. My mom made every day ife very special.

[AmandaVT]

I didn't have the most exciting childhood, but it was nice. 

 

School, after-school sports (mandatory at my school), gymnastics, and piano. Until high school, then I dopped the gymnastics and joined the orchestra instead of piano. Summers were spent at the beach - rain or shine. We went to Disney a few times, skiing, Hawaii once and Europe once. We were not rich by the standards of the people I went to school with, but looking back on it, we had everything we needed and quite a bit that we wanted.

[Χά�ων]

My parents adopted me when they were ready to settle down. I have concluded that settle down means they were doing living life and were ready to go to work, come home and stare at the TV every day. Because that is what they did.

 

Before they settled down they traveled Europe and Asia, camped on beaches in two continents, threw and attended parties, immersed themselves into other cultures and actually had lived life to the fullest

 

I do not understand the mentality. They have lived in the same area for 40 years and still have not visited the internationally aclaimed attractions I do not get it.

[prairiewindmomma]

I did.  It helped that family was about, though. I spent a lot of time with both of my grandmothers cleaning house & making food & pulling weeds.  I read for hours a day.  When I was bored, I'd wander through the fields behind my house.

 

Now, I think it's rather idyllic.

 

 

[heartlikealion]

I think you can look at it different ways. I also thought it sounded kinda relaxing and less stressful. Although funds are part of the reason we limit what activities the kids are involved in, I do not envy those that have something planned several days of the week, week after week. Makes me exhausted just thinking about it.

 

Nowadays when we go out dd informs me she wants to go home. Ds doesn't get particularly excited about going anywhere (well, maybe the movies).

 

When I was a kid I played basketball some years, but not all. In high school I was not in any extracurricular activities after 9th grade (they made it a requirement to put basketball as a class period when I entered 10th and I had other electives that I needed to take like keyboarding. By the time my schedule cleared up I felt like I was too out of shape/practice to try out). I put off driver's ed til my senior year. I didn't have a particularly exciting social life as a kid/teen. But I also didn't get into situations that some of my peers did (not judging, just saying I think I dodged a bullet).

[Penelope]

I never thought about it much.

 

I guess if the standard is lots of vacations to faraway places, then maybe. But when I was growing up, I didn’t know any middle class kids whose parents were taking them to Europe. Parents who were better off would take the trips themselves and leave the kids at home with grandma for a few weeks. I also think it was less common decades ago for kids to play a couple of sports and a couple of instruments all at the same time. Despite the middle class stagnation of the past decade or so, standards of living overall are higher than thirty years ago in the US.

 

I think younger kids today don’t always have enough free time to just be without being scheduled in activities or passively entertained by a screen. As adulthood approaches, having more opportunities becomes more important.

[Tanaqui]

Well, I'd rather have a boring but happy childhood than one that's interesting but maybe a little less happy - like living in a warzone or being genocided or having abusive parents or something.