Grew up surrounded by farms in rural Ontario. My parents did a great job of driving me to friends houses to socialize, but when there wasn't an organized play date I had two options: stay at home or go wander. I usually opted to stay at home and read or play video games but I did often just pick a direction and go walking. My parents made me take a hunting knife with me and only let me do this around the age of 12. While it is great to romanticize my wandering in the wilderness, it was typically pretty boring. As a result I played more video games as I got older.

My best friend lived in a sort of suburb (still very rural) but we'd spend all day biking around, meeting other kids, getting up to trouble, and making grand adventures to the store to buy mountain dew. This was all the way up until high school. After 14 I was too busy with school and sports in the academic year to do anything else, and in the summer I worked at a camp.

I talked to my mom about this recently and she said that 'kids can't just wander around anymore it's unsafe' and I'd argue that a child with a smart phone that constantly pings their location is a million times safer than whatever the hell we were doing.

I think the challenge is that parents are more anxious and video games and social media are way more convenient than anything outside the house, making a perfect storm. I don't remember leaving the house as much as a kid because there was that much to do outside, but rather we had exhausted all the activities at home. I feel like now you have unlimited options for entertainment at home so why bother, especially if your parents would rather you be at home anyways.