Scary Things to Do to Your Kids

Scary thing #1:

Let them play on train tracks.

I've always been afraid of trains, but I don't know why. I used to shudder every time I would drive under a train track overpass, and when I heard the whistle of a train. I got over the whistle thing once my mom moved near a train track and I heard it all the time. Maybe it's because my mom's best childhood friend's sister got ran over and killed by a train.

Well, tonight as I was driving to get my kids a pie baby, I saw 3 kids playing on a train track. This is a well-used track, and the kids looked like they were maybe 3, 6, and 8. I didn't think much of it as I passed by on the way to get that pie baby, but when they were still there on the way back I got a little worried. There is a small church right on the tracks, and in the parking lot I saw a jeep with one door wide open. There were no people in the parking lot. The boys looked like they were dressed for church.

What would you have done in this situation? I mean, what's appropriate? Do you go home & call the police? Do you jump out of your car right there & pull the kids off the tracks? What if your own kids are in the car with you?

I ended up calling the police when I got home, but I was watching and listening for a train the entire time, worried to death for those kids. At the end of the conversation with the dispatcher I was asked a weird question - "are they all white kids?" But that's a whole 'nother blog post altogether...