This morning I awoke rather early, getting ready to experience a lovely day. The sun was shining outside in the brisk morning air. I stood looking out of a large window watching the bright yellow gleam intensify as that great ball of energy rose up and solidified its hold upon the world.

As I was basking in the heat of the sun's rays, I heard a noise coming from the street. Thinking it was a car going along, I looked down to see two little kids riding a skateboard toboggan-style down the middle of the street. The street goes down steeply and obviously they were picking up quite a bit of momentum.

My first thought upon seeing this was, "My god, how dangerous! If a car was driving up that street right now, they could be really hurt." And to a lesser extent, perhaps just as an afterthought, "They shouldn't be doing that." I thought this even though I had a smile on my face because I knew how much fun they were probably having.

Then I stopped to think about my reaction.

The instance was dangerous, that was true. But was it really the kids fault that their action was dangerous? They were only doing what kids do all over the world, rolling down a hill. What kid has never rolled down a hill? I mean, I consider myself an `adult' and I still like to go out and take a tumble down some mean slopes. It's pretty damn enjoyable.

I could further imagine someone coming out of their house to find the children doing this and yelling at them to stop. But isn't it in the nature of children to go out and experience life as fully as possible, in any given moment? Which means that if there is a hill there, it is obviously meant for someone to enjoy. It is only by such means of exploration that children can learn. Yet often I see someone reprimanding a child for doing such dangerous things, as if it was the child's fault that we live in such a dangerous world.

After all, adults contribute a lot to the dangers in the world around us. And while it is true that if we did not have all the technology that we do have, the world would still be a dangerous place, it might not be quite as dangerous.

Take, for instance, two methods of travel; by foot and by car. Out of the two, it is obvious which one came first. Also out of those two, it is obvious which can cause the most harm.

When you are walking, there aren't that many dangers that come from simply moving one foot in front of the other. Sure, if you really disturb some natural denizen of the world in your travels, that creature could try to maul you. But freak occurrences will happen wherever you go, and if an occurrence isn't a freak one then it can be explained. Likewise if it can be explained it can also be consciously avoided. Of course, and some people might well say unfortunately, that requires effort. Well, there are always people who don't want to put a lot of effort into their life, for them there is always a possibility of being hurt by someone or something.

Regardless, the point is that except for the occasional sleepy walker who bumps into a tree or stubs a toe, walking is not that dangerous in and of itself.

Now, take a look at driving. When one is driving a car at fifty or sixty miles per hour and something gets in the way of that car, something bad is bound to happen. Even putting that aside, if one starts to get sleepy or just plain falls asleep behind the wheel, or just starts not thinking about what he or she is doing, there can be disastrous consequences. As a reminder, here are some possibilities; a) wreck your car b) wreck someone else's car c) injure or KILL someone (this includes yourself) d) damage something else (a beautiful tree, lovely house, historic monument, just use your imagination...) e) any and all of the above. And what if you just happen to bump into something by accident, well, refer to above, I trust you can understand my point.

Bump into someone walking, on the other hand, maybe they will take offense (depending on how touchy they are, which is really just foolishness anyway) but on the whole there isn't too much actual damage done. And, for those people who must argue, I've already touched upon the difference between freaky occurrences and everything else.

So, where am I getting with this? Actually, to be honest, I almost lost it myself... Oh yes, children and fun in relation to the world we adults have made for them to live in. Isn't it nice to know that we have responsibility in keeping the world the way it is so that our children can't experience all the life they want to.

And that is only glancing at cars in comparison to walking. I don't even want to get into guns. If I do that then doubtless war itself will come up. And WAR is just too big a topic for me right now. I get frustrated enough thinking that we as adults can't put forth the effort to make our world as safe for our children as we wish it was. When brothers fight brothers and sisters fight sisters and everyone fights each other... well, I've said it all right there. If you don't see the madness and sadness of it then there isn't anything more I can say.

Was it wrong to think that what those kids were doing was dangerous and that they should stop? No. I think it is wrong that our world is the kind of place where we have to say that it is too dangerous for children to roll down hills. I think it is wrong that we should have to tell fun-loving children to stop. But sometimes, in today's world, it is necessary all too often.