Turner thesis and childhood

I grew up in the midst of thousands of acres of forest, owned by the University of North Carolina. There were big woods out back, it felt like the original frontier vision writ small, looking west, a great mass of forest. I identified more with your Davy Crocketts than your cowboys, but still. So when I read about the Turner Thesis in high school, it made perfect sense.

At our elementary school there was a big ditch in the area with called "down the hill." We thought of it as a canyon and staged epic cowboy and indian battles there. Nearby was an indian grave. I kid you not.

My kids don't have this same mythic construct. Near our house, behind a science building, is a drainage ditch that Graham was running down into not long ago. All grass, mind you, no mud. What is his perceptual background for this space? How will this impact him later in life? I guess kids have grown up around New York before without a sense of openness. But look at them.