Was it a mistake? Magic 8 Ball isn't so sure ...

teen beat, originally uploaded by toyfoto.

“If you don’t stop fighting this instant, I’m going to pull the car over and put you both out!”

Well, a well-heeled Scarsdale mother gave those usually empty words teeth earlier this week when she pulled her vehicle over in a White Plains business district, three miles from home, and ordered her bickering children (10- and 12-year-old girls) to exit the car and then drove off.

It would seem almost comical to me — a person who throughout her own formative years heard that same threat enough to ignore it without even batting an eye — except that the mother was subsequently arrested and issued a restraining order requiring she have no contact with the kids, who were unharmed by the event.

And then parents, who were asked to comment for follow-up news stories, came out in droves to say what a different world it is today; and how, even though they empathize with the mom's frustrations, they themselves could never actually drive away.

It’s impossible to glean details from published reports as to where the girls were left — along a highway or in a strip mall — or whether the mother came back to get them. Some broadcast reports have the 12-year-old running after the car and being allowed back in, while the 10 year-old was found crying by strangers, who contacted police. Regardless, I just can’t understand how anyone would waste the court’s time with such a case.

This is where I launch into the bit about when I was 10 years old I was riding my bike, helmetless, five miles along narrow, winding roads to a friend’s house and back.

(I’ll spare you the tale of it being uphill both ways.)

I realize there are SO MANY PEOPLE who think things are different these days; and that people are different and can’t be trusted. And that cars are different, and too big. And that drivers have really bad peripheral vision and virtually no spot in the back window that isn’t blind, not to mention that they are always on their cell phones … or texting anyway; doing anything, but paying attention to the road.

Let's not forget about about the abandonment issues.

These poor, sad children ... with their ipods and cell phones, living in tony neighborhoods ... with a frazzled and ineffective mother.

To have their mother drive away is just cruel proof she doesn’t love them.

Yes. It’s probably best she was arrested and that a restraining order was issued and that she was barred from seeing them until the matter can be sorted out by one of the more underworked case managers in the system.

Unless, of course, the kids had had a cell phone …

and could have called their dad. …

Or a cab.

Or if they didn't, (gasp) maybe they could have stuck together ...

and looked out for one another.

I forgot. We don't do that anymore.