Life on the street gets tougher

[flashl]

By MARTHA IRVINE, AP National Writer

The young caller's voice is high-pitched and trembling.

Her mother's been drinking, she says. They got into a fistfight, so the girl grabbed her backpack and a cell phone and bolted, with little thought about where a 13-year-old could go on a cold night.

Hiding in an alley off her rural hometown's deserted main street, she calls the only phone number she can think of: 1-800-RUNAWAY.

"I just don't feel like I'm taken care of like a daughter should be," the girl tells the volunteer who answers the phone at the National Runaway Switchboard. She stutters between sobs and shivers.

...

The information she gave the hot line checked out. However, her name and other identifying details could not be included for this story because the National Runaway Switchboard guarantees callers confidentiality.

...

Further complicating the matter, the Runaway Switchboard has found that more crisis callers than ever are 14 and younger — 1,255 in that age group in 2000, compared with 1,844 last year.

"The reality is, there are not always services available for kids who are calling," says Maureen Blaha, executive director of the National Runaway Switchboard, which began as a Chicago area crisis hot line in 1971 and went national three years later. "We try to be as creative as we can be to find solutions. But there isn't always a simple answer."

YN

Another missing safety net.

[bananas]

1. k&r nt

[fasttense]

2. Lazy 13 year olds.

They should get a job. If they can't find a job, they should just start their own business. Prostitution seems to be doing well for pre-pubescent girls. :sarcasm:

[girl gone mad]

3. If only stores weren't open..

24 hours and on weekends. Our problems would be solved. :sarcasm:

But, seriously, as a former teenage runaway, these stories break my heart. I was lucky that I fell in with groups of punk squatters and never had to resort to prostitution, though I had many friends who hustled. It's impossible to get even a McJob when you're a minor without a permanent address.