Fear - People - Children

I tell myself a lot of things; really, I'm a shockingly good companion for myself. Truths and lies and by-the-bys, why, there's nothing I won't soliloquy. I dialogue and diatribe, digest and deny, and pages and pages of diary define such directionless drivels. And nowhere I go, quickly, faster than you know.
Yesterday, while failing rather spectacularly (the result wasn't spectacular, only the difference between the result and reality) at drawing, a rather adorable boy (aged roughly four), came scampering across a wide field towards me. I was seated upon a bench, gazing into the orchards of hazelnuts and across a grassy field, and the boy, breathless and excited, came scampering all the way across the field directly towards me.
His sisters, aged probably fifteen, saw where he was heading (me) and frantically began chasing him, racing to recapture the renegade child - but they were too far behind, and the boy reached my little bench and plopped down beside me.
"I'm tiiiiiiiired" he said to no one in particular, breathless, and slumping down in adorable fashion.
I smiled and said he'd run a long way and so fast! He was quite the little runner.
By this time, his sisters had arrived, and with many apologies, they took the boy away as quickly as possible, hastening him to another bench, though he'd been no bother whatsoever.
I remember hearing a story from a russian missionary when I was a child that I've never quite let go. They said it was not unusual for a neighbor in their small town to knock on the door in the wee hours of the morning, 1am, 3am, or even a random stranger. In these instances, the owner of the household would rush to the door, and welcome the stranger into their house, offering them food and hospitality. Often, the missionary said, they would not even lock the doors, and would always be prepared with drink and food, even to make a feast in the middle of the night for someone they did not know.
This hospitality and kindness is so dissonant with the american individualism and paranoia, but it's beautiful, too. I always cherished that level of kindness and consideration, and that level of community. In America, we're trained right from the moment we can understand that strangers are not to be trusted. The little boy wasn't old enough, but his sisters were well conditioned to be wary of strangers, and to hasten his separation from me - am I creepy or frightening? Dear Lord, I hope not - and shepherded him away from me in a frenetic string of apology.
There was fear.
A couple of days ago, a little boy was looking over the railing of his apartment complex while his mother hung laundry below. When I walked past on the sidewalk, the little boy began waving with a mighty wiggle, shaking his whole body in his excitement to say hello.
"Hello! Hello! Hello!" he called out to me excitedly.
I turned and waved at him. "Hi! Hello!" and gave him a broad smile.
The boy, likely also four, or maybe three years of age, turned to his mother and said, "Mother, the stranger said hi! Is that okay?"
It bothered me a bit, this fright.
There are many things that are more worthy of fear (spiders, wasps, hookworms, spilt juice), but we indoctrinate our children right from the get-go to fear every unfamiliar face. And the saddest part of it all is, sometimes, a lot of times, I can't blame them. Watching the news, it sometimes seems like  only a matter of time before something monstrous shows up on the front porch. Why can't people be good?