Kerry Parnell: Being stranded without a car made me realise something very important
Our reliance on cars is clogging up the roads and damaging the environment. On the one hand we’re banning plastic bags, on the other, we’re driving five minutes up the road. It’s crazy, writes Kerry Parnell.
Rendezview
Don't miss out on the headlines from Rendezview. Followed categories will be added to My News.
It’s World Car Free Day today, which is just as well because I haven’t got one.
Thanks to one of those annoying little life problems, our family car has been unexpectedly grounded for a week or so.
Initially I found myself in a panic, wondering how in the hell I could get my kids to school without a car — until it dawned on me the solution was staring me in the face, if I just looked down.
“Ah”, I thought, “What are these things attached to my body? Legs, I think I’ve heard them called.” And yes, if I remember correctly, you can use them to move about and get yourself from A to B.
“We’re walking to school today, girls,” I told my three and five-year-old daughters, in a kind of panicked high-pitch screech, packing a backpack with supplies for the arduous 1.5-kilometre trek from our house. In my defence, half of that distance is up an extremely steep hill and the other half across a field.
READ MORE FROM KERRY PARNELL: The problem with TV today? There’s too much choice
And so, like an SAS sergeant, I marshalled my unit and began the march to school. Despite the five-year-old complaining her legs hurt two minutes in, it was surprisingly pleasant and not too difficult. But it was extremely quiet. We passed no-one else, but were passed by plenty of cars.
As we ambled along, I thought of all the kids in days past who would have trodden this route in our country location — climbing the same hill, swishing through the same grass — on their own from a very early age. We all did; I walked to school with my older siblings, then later took my younger sister. It was unthinkable that parents had to escort you.
My 81-year-old mother-in-law (who can still jauntily climb that hill herself) thinks it outrageous that children don’t walk to school anymore and I can see her point. With the rise of car ownership in the past couple of generations, we’ve actually become less free, not more. And now because nobody lets their kids walk to school unaccompanied, it’s not particularly safe to do so. If I waved my five-year-old off up our country road today, I would be arrested for child neglect.
READ MORE FROM KERRY PARNELL: Horror movies are just not for me
And so we all get in our cars, clogging up the roads, burning unnecessary fuel and damaging the environment. Which is not really progress at all. In fact, it’s crazy. On the one hand we’re banning plastic bags, on the other, we’re driving five minutes up the road.
Meanwhile, there’s a national health crisis as obesity rates continue to increase and we search for more and more ways to get healthy, following fad diets and driving (again) to the gym — because we think we need to travel to a special place and pay a monthly fee to exercise.
When instead we can have all the cake and eat it with no consequences, by burning the very best — and greenest — kind of energy there is, foot-power. The whole family keeps fit, helps save the environment and eases traffic problems.
I really think we could be on to something with this walking idea. If only the Baby Boomers had thought of it before …