<p>There is no way my kids could be as “bad” as I was! Of course, I still am pretty foolish when given the opportunity. For example, two years ago when my daughter was auditioning at UCLA a dad asked me if I wanted to have a tour of the area since I was from NY and he was third generation LA. We had around 2 hours to kill so I said sure. My daughter was apoplectic that I did that and, in retrospect, I guess she was right. Oh well, peace, love, and understanding!</p>
<p>Hey, don’t feel so bad. My MIL did that-in Turkey! She was on a cruise and met some man in a bar, he invited her and her girlfriends to tour Istanbul. Of course he was a respectable and upstanding man and my MIL and her friends were in their 60’s. If my D did that I would have a cow!</p>
<p>My SIL and I were no angels in schools, our H’s were (brother’s!). I always tell my kids, your Dad never did anything in High School!</p>
<p>Out with some guy, I wound up at a party miles from my campus where drugs flowed round, the guy vanished and I freaked and made some maybe somewhat sober guy drive me home. What was I thinking.</p>
<p>I was pretty much of a goody-goody, but I did hitchhike in France (at the age of 16) at the urging of my French family. (I was with another young woman.) We had a really unpleasant experience with a truck driver which resulted us in taking the train halfway there and needless to say I haven’t hitchhiked since. I also used to get semi-picked up by guys in museums all the time. I actually enjoyed them until they started getting suggestive. I remember one of them knew a huge amount about the miniatures at the Victoria and Albert. They never scared me like that truck driver though. They just seemed lonely.</p>
<p>I smoked a little pot. I explored the steam tunnels at Yale. I wore my army jacket with my school uniform. I’m pathetic!</p>
<p>I went with my BIL’s 18 year old niece (I was 14) to a party on the other side of Miami… I knew Philadelphia (my town) cold but nothing about Miami. Lots and lots of drinking–they were all college students–until the niece asked me to drive home because she was too drunk to drive. So… I learned how to drive and how to drive a stickshift, all at the same time, at 2 AM in Miami.</p>
<p>There are still things I haven’t shared with my mom about my first year in college at the Univ. of Hawaii- that I met a guy in a bar whom I lived off and on with for that year, rode all over Oahu on the back of his motorcycle, spent the night on the beach in Kauai after flying there on a small private plane flown by his best friend who I barely knew, and on a different excursion went sail planing in a small two-seater sail plane with this same pilot friend. These were the days of communes and flower-power, and although I didn’t partake, I hardly knew anyone at the time who didn’t. Oh, and I also had a brief affair with my drama teacher…bad idea. At least he was single…;)</p>
<p>After one year, I decided that I was never going to take school seriously if I stayed on the island, and came home to a rather boring existence at a UC, where I wasn’t too distracted to study.</p>
<p>I did such bad things, I would have to create a whole new screen name before I could even contemplate sharing them here. One good thing, it has made me a very understanding and tolerant parent. Let’s just say that based on my own past history, my standards for what constitute a child’s success are very low. In spite of this, or maybe because, my kids are pretty straight arrows.</p>
<p>God help me, I don’t know how it is I’m still alive. But I can’t give details, because my son occasionally looks on cc.</p>
<p>The only thing I’ve admitted to, is one time I did go supersonic accidentally, when I was 22. Probably scared some farmers cows…but I never admitted it.</p>
<p>One of the smartest things I ever did was, when my son was quite young, tell him I would discuss ANY subject openly with him, but I would NOT answer specific questions about whether I did or did not do some particular act. For example, he could ask me any question about sex, but not ask me about my sexual history. This has worked out great.</p>
<p>I may have shared some experiences with mousegray- not only did I move out @ 17 & live with a drug dealer in what is now wineryville, but I ingested about everything ( illegal) you could think of ( at the time) without using needles. ( albeit I have a limited imagination- so lets just say it was more than marijuana)</p>
<p>But really I don’t regret it- because he was very kind and supportive and he was the one ( I had dropped out of high school) who originally encouraged me to take my GED exam and go to college. </p>
<p>However- while we are all here to tell the tales- many are not-
Not only PsychoMomTXs’ son but one of my best friends drowned along with another friend when trying to cross a lake one night ( fueled by alcohol Im sure- but I wasn’t present).- and several other friends had died or had been severely injured in separate- even sometimes what had appeared to have been initially minor accidents.
It’s * so hard* to maintain perspective- on the one hand we survived , on the other hand we want our kids to survive too.</p>
<p>tell him I would discuss ANY subject openly with him,</p>
<p>I think that is a great attitude to have Skyhook- but I admit that while I tried to have accurate information available re sex and physical changes, and made attempts at discussing them ( I seriously didn’t know how babies were concieved until late grade school age) I was really awkward which I think was discouraging.</p>
<p>They did know all the scientific terms at a young age however- and used them @ the dinner table at my inlaws!</p>
<p>Once in hs I rode with a friend who I knew had been drinking, quite a bit. His car didn’t have seatbelts - if it did, we never used them. We went to a friend’s house that was near the top of a big hill on a narrow, windy road, and we “bounced” off the curb several times… :eek:</p>
<p>I have to admit that I participated in all the usual events of my day which seemed to involve a lot more drinking and driving… But EK I also remember this being one of my mother’s favorite expressions!</p>
