He's about 10 years older than I am, so he was born in the early 70s and I in the early 80s, but our daughters are the same age and are best friends. He was lamenting that his daughter lacks basic skills such as navigating her way from one place to another or maintaining awareness of her surroundings, and he seemed very concerned that something might be wrong with her cognitively. He compared her to when he was her age and said he could find his way home from anywhere in his neighborhood and was totally capable of functioning independently. I tried to point out to him that it's likely because many of us don't just turn our kids loose to run around the neighborhood these days like many of us grew up doing. Parenting in the modern day is a balancing act of protecting your kids from what feels like an expotentially-increased number of dangers vs. sheltering them so much that they never learn to become independent, and I told my friend that his daughter is not at all unique in her current lack of independence. I don't think it's a stretch to state that (generally speaking) America in 2026 is less safe for kids than it was in the 70s and 80s when a lot of us grew up. Child predators have always existed, but their prevalence seems much greater today, and they have many more avenues by which to interact with children than by simply kidnapping them. As a parent, it feels like I have to constantly be a shield for my daughter at the outset of any new environment until I can establish a relative assurance of safety, all the while recognizing that the trade-off for me protecting my child is some loss of experiential learning on her part. It sucks that this is the modern reality, but I am going to always err on the side of protecting my child's physical wellbeing. If, as a result, it takes her an extra year or two to become fully independent, so be it. She's getting the basics about what being responsible looks like at home...it might just take a little more time for her to learn to put it into practice.