Idle Parenting - Yes or No?

I came across this parenting story recently while browsing at The Telegraph website. Basically, what the author is trying to say is - if you want your children to be happy, let them be children. Don't foist upon them the responsibilities of adulthood before they're ready to deal with them. His own experience with his own children has convinced him that this is the way to raise happy children.

I thought about my own childhood when I read that article. My parents were always around but they were usually busy helping out in the family kopitiam to fuss too much over me. I was free to play all day long (as long as I finished my homework and practised my piano) and play I did. I played at being a mountaineer climbing Mt Everest on our little staircase, I played at being an X-wing fighter shooting down Imperial fighters. If the neighbourhood kids were all game, we would all be 100m sprinters competing in the sidewalk Olympics. I nicked rubberbands from Grandpa's stash and linked them up to make a rope and played lompat with other kids.
Then I thought of a childhood friend whose father set many rules and tried to make little adults out of them. While I tumbled around in the school field and played in the sun, she was required to sit primly in the shade. My aunt danced with me to the Grease soundtrack and my uncle taught me Elvis songs. Her father required her to be silent and well-behaved at all times.

I've grown up to be a happy, sensible, cheerful sort of adult. I don't know how she's turned out but at least I know that my parents' unwitting idling parenting did work for me. :)