It was a gloriously beautiful morning for opening day of Urbana’s Market at the Square last Saturday. A more lively first week of Market season I could not recall.
We headed to the parking lot to move on with our day, our bellies full with yummy pastry and kettle corn. Before we started to pack up the kids into my minivan we heard a small voice say:
“Can you help me find my mom?”
In a white minivan parked close to mine, there was a little boy — we guessed he was 9 — sitting in the front seat by himself.
This innocent little boy was sitting in a minivan while his mom shopped in the market. And he wanted to get out and find her.
We felt we had no other choice but to call the police. This boy was left unattended in a vehicle on a hot day. And what if someone else had found him? I shuddered to think about the possibilities. What if his mom had had an emergency? We wanted to give her the benefit of the doubt, but mostly we wanted to allay the fears of a scared little boy, sitting alone in a minivan while his mom shopped in the market.
My friend called the police. I told her to go ahead and I would wait for the police to get there. I got so antsy that after about eight minutes I called the Urbana dispatch again, and they said they had someone on their way.
I asked the little boy how old he was.
7.
He wanted to get out of the car to go and find his mom. I calmly told him that someone was on the way to help him, and that I would wait with him until he was safe.
About 18 minutes later — it felt like an hour — from the time the little boy asked us to him find his mom, a woman showed up. I told her what happened and informed her that I had called the police, who not a second later arrived at the scene.
I do not know what happened from there. The officer took my statement and I left. I have no idea how long it had been since she initially left the car. Regardless, 18 minutes — in my opinion — is WAY too long for a 7-year-old to be left alone in the car.
Here’s what I do know: in Illinois it is ILLEGAL to leave kids in cars unattended if they are under the age of 7, for longer than 10 minutes. I’m not sure how this act is viewed by law enforcement when the child is over 6 but under 14. And in the summer, when cars can heat up rapidly in the heat of the day, it is flat-out dangerous.
I don’t even like to do leave the kids alone in the car when it’s in my closed garage.
My point here is not to judge this mother. The window was cracked open and the car was parked in the shade. Every parent needs a break sometimes — we all know this. And it’s certainly 10 times faster to get your shopping done when you don’t have a child tagging along.
But if you need to leave your child to get your shopping done, there are certainly safer ways to do so.
Not everyone would agree with what we did by calling the police. Lenore Skenazy, blogger and author of “Free-Range Kids: How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children (Without Going Nuts with Worry).” has written a significant amount on this topic, and thinks that most people are overzealous when it comes to dealing with parents who leave kids in cars alone.
So call me a helicopter parent, or a nervous nelly. But I know I will sleep better tonight knowing that we helped a little boy who just wanted someone to help him find his mom.
Laura Weisskopf Bleill is the co-founder and editor of chambanamoms.com. You can reach her at laura@chambanamoms(dot)com.