Always Set A Good Example

On May 31, I witnessed an event that, however perilous, is all too common. At about 3 p.m. I was traveling east on 37th Avenue in my car with my 14-month-old son. We were stopped behind a city bus, waiting to cross Grand. On my left a steady flow of parents were picking children up at Jefferson Elementary School. As I waited behind the bus, a woman on the sidewalk in front of the school took the hands of a couple of young children and proceeded to jaywalk between the bus and my car. I’ve seen this occurrence many times before. Normally I give a disapproving glance and mind my own business. But I happen to be three months pregnant, and seeing this woman take this unsafe action with her children stirred up all those protective, motherly hormones racing around in my body.

Impulsively, I rolled down my window and said, “You should use the crosswalk.”

The woman glared at me. Maybe she thought I was irritated at having to wait for her to cross the street. I don’t think she heard my next words: “What are you teaching your children?”

Parents, naturally, tell their children to cross safely at the crosswalk. However, when they flout this rule themselves, parents seriously undermine the chances that their children will “do as I say and not as I do.”

We’ve all done it - reasoned to ourselves that we can just look both ways and cross when there are no cars coming. Children may not have the ability to judge when it’s safe, and they need to rely upon the regulations at a crosswalk or intersection. I can think of a couple of recent tragic examples of local children who have made poor decisions in traffic and paid dearly for them. I hesitate to name specific cases because of the pain their families have already experienced.

Most parents know better than to swear or say things they don’t want others to hear (“Aunt Hilda looks like death warmed over.”) in front of their kids. Children soak up things grownups say like a sponge and repeat them, often at the most inopportune moments.

Children retain other things, too, and often they learn more by example than by what they are told. If you thought obeying traffic crossing rules could some day save your child’s life, wouldn’t you observe them to the letter? Or is it more important to save a few minutes of your precious time by dashing across the street between cars?