Hide-and-go-seek.

What are we really trying to accomplish here?

Every time I step outside of my door, I begin a new game of hide-and-go-seek.  I'm usually the seeker.  I'm looking for something different; for groceries; for something that I once knew, but lost somewhere along the line; for something that I didn't lose, but I can only get out there; for answers; for delight; for catalysts; for reasons; for questions.

There's always a sense of adventure, being the seeker... of forcing oneself to look into scary or secret places to win the game.  But then there's the fun of being the hider.  And I like that, too.  The anticipation of being discovered... is... exciting.  *see aside below. 

Here we go, Day 249: https://ia800308.us.archive.org/35/items/Improv41912/20120419144122.mp3


*Playing hide-and-seek-in-the-dark with my Dad is, to this day, the height of anxiety.  You see, once game play begins, he becomes the actual Boogie Man.  He senses the perfect timing of allowing his victims to feel at ease before unleashing a grotesquely loud, mind-engulfing RAWR, which doesn't seem all that bad here in Blogland, but if you could experience it as a small child, you would understand the full gravity of this art.  Last time we played, my Dad hid, and I was teamed up with my little 4-year-old niece.  Knowing there were few places left to inspect, and relying on her naivety, I said, "You go check in the bathroom... go on."  It was quiet.  Too quiet.  She squeezed my hand, and said, "I'm scared, Auntie Maew."  I squeezed back, and with complete, thirty-year-old sincerity, whispered, "Me, too."  And then I started giggling crazily and uncontrollably, under the pressure of my nervousness, and the ridiculousness that it was just my Dad hiding.  My sister could verify the scariness of this situation with a bevy of anecdotal evidence.