Kids around here are also allowed to walk home from kindergarten on up. And we have some seriously shady areas around here. I live literally on the property that divides school districts here, and my kid will be taken by bus to a school further away, while my neighbors kids walk to a school nearby.
But I am just as uncomfortable. I don't trust the bus drivers. i don't trust the crossing guards. I don't trust the guy at the gas station. i don't trust the waitress at the diner I ate at this afternoon. My faith in humanity is gone. I use to love living my life with the outlook of "I'd rather trust everyone and eventually be wrong than to not trust anyone and eventually be right" , not anymore though. I know too much now, and yet I know nothing. I look at every single person within sight of my child and think the same exact thing anymore. "I don't trust you!" I use to hate the though of people living like this, but now I live like it myself.
I was outside working in the yard earlier and I was on a ladder. My 3 year old was right below me, and I wasn't high, just enough to reach a branch that I was working on... maybe 5 feet off the ground. A car pulled up in front of my house and stopped. In a single breath I hit the ground, swiped up my little guy and had taken the 10 foot walk to the house to sit him inside the doorway. All I could think of was... I don't care what this person wants, they now know I have a child and I HATE the thought of that! I don't trust them!
We can plead and lobby and fight the officials all we want, and things may or may not get done right eventually, but in the meantime I am going back to basics. Street smarts. It may not save them, but it certainly can go a long way to help. These sick people need to be fought head on, nothing else it working. I know the thought of a young child fighting off these overpowering monsters is pretty far fetched, but like someone above mentioned, knock over everything, kick, scream, blow a whistle, pepper spray, bite, punch, gouge out the eyes, the whole time screaming! Unfortunately, with the world today, I really think we need to go this route. We need to take this world and our kids back from these animals.
RIP little angel Somer

You didn't deserve any of this.
I'm sorry for side tracking folks.