I raised three boys. To my knowledge none of them have ever hitchhiked. But I would not make the statement that none of them ever would, especially if one of their friends said they had a history of hitching.
And from experience, I can tell you that every time I've thought one of them would not do something, one of them did. You think you know your child better than anyone, but that is not always true.
I could state a dozen examples of the things I found out after mine were grown, but I will spare you all. :blushing::blushing:
Darn it I took time to sleep and do the dishes and laundry and now I'm way behind again.
Apologies if this has already been discussed, I'm trying to catch up but every time I finish one page another 1-2 pages pop up! I'm sure you can all relate.
Regarding the hitching, I'm still surprised how many people have commented that it's rare. I believe everyone's personal accounts of course, it's just really surprising to me. While I agree it's dangerous or can be, it's done a lot where I live (suburb of a large city in California). IMO it's probably even more common in rural mountain communities. I know this is or might be a little OT but I hope it's ok. Just a few hitch-hiking stories.
I live in a much larger community than Bayfield or Vallecito, but can recall numerous hitch-hikers in recent years. One was a boy carrying a raft who forgot about the need for transportation at the END of the rafting trip and not just the beginning. I was driving a few people back to the "start" point and picked him up after seeing him struggling up the street with his raft and begging for a ride. He was in the car 20-30 minutes with me and a couple of other people I'd only known a few hours. Probably dangerous for all of us, now that I think about it... but it was such an innocent thing, makes me mad it could be considered dangerous.
Another example, my husband nearly picked up a young teenage girl (age was his guess) who was sitting next to the road crying with her thumb out to catch a ride. He said she was obviously distraught but also obviously vulnerable, pretty, and very tiny/petite. Hubby wanted to take her somewhere safer but he realized how quickly late-30s man with distraught young teen girl in the car could turn very, very ugly even though he had the best of intentions, so he didn't pick her up. He did call the police to go check on her.
It's just upsetting. I get that hitch-hiking is probably not the safest activity but is it really so rare? and so dangerous? Is it happening way more than people, especially parents, might realize?
I guess what I'm getting at in a long roundabout way is I'm a kind-hearted innocent person in a fairly large sized suburb and I see hitch-hikers quite a bit. Until reading this thread it never even occurred to me what a prime target that would make for a predator. It just doesn't seem that far-fetched to me that Dylan might hitch-hike, and find himself in a very bad situation.
TIA
