NaBloPoMo, Day 6 - Why you don't leave a 16-year-old home alone for a week
Monday morning. While my parents and I were visiting on Saturday morning, they shared that their next door neighbors had left their 16-year-old son home alone for a week while they went to Mexico to vacation in their timeshare. Guess what happened? Shockingly, the kid through a major rager party on Friday night with his buddies. *gasp* Can you imagine that? An empty house, 50 kids on a high school team, and they threw a party - wow. You know what's worse? When the parents got home, they yelled at my parents for not having gone over there and cleaned the little beggars out. Hello? My parents are both over 65, they had no legal authority to enter that house without the parents being home, and they would never have been able to clean 50 rowdy teenagers out of that house. I'm so angry that I'm about ready to call Child Protective Services on them because I'm a required reporter for child abuse/neglect and leaving a child under 18 at home alone without a caretaker for an extended period of time is illegal in California. (Yeah, I'm mean like that.)
So, my Top Five list for today is Top Five Reasons Not to Leave a 16-Year-Old at Home Alone:
1. Group-think ("everyone else is doing it, why shouldn't I?")
2. Lack of good nutritional judgment ("potato chips aren't a veggie???")
3. General untidiness ("why use the dining room table when the couch is closer to the TV?")
4. The goodwill of your neighbors (no one likes having to call the cops at 10:30 p.m., midnight, and 1:00 a.m. in order to be able to sleep peacefully)
5. Because it's illegal ('nuff said).
So, my Top Five list for today is Top Five Reasons Not to Leave a 16-Year-Old at Home Alone:
1. Group-think ("everyone else is doing it, why shouldn't I?")
2. Lack of good nutritional judgment ("potato chips aren't a veggie???")
3. General untidiness ("why use the dining room table when the couch is closer to the TV?")
4. The goodwill of your neighbors (no one likes having to call the cops at 10:30 p.m., midnight, and 1:00 a.m. in order to be able to sleep peacefully)
5. Because it's illegal ('nuff said).
Comments
I don't believe that high school age children should ever be left alone even overnight. There's just too much that can happen. Even if you trust your kid, you can't always trust his schoolmates if (when?) they find out.
That's stupid.
And I'm a mandatory reporter now too, and I would also be tempted to report them.