Boys

“Spirit of South Dakota” in Huron

From the 5th grade on, I lived on 14th Street, a one block row of modest homes in small town America. The unusual thing was the block was chock full of boys my age, Ev, Steve, Dan, Dave, and me; we lived within four houses of one another. If you drew the circle a couple of blocks further out, there were even more boys, Bill, Rick, Steve H, Dud, and many I don’t remember. Most of us played together for those years, the years before we became boys with ambition. That is, before girls, sports, and other semi-adult activities. I digress

My favorite game was our version of hide and seek. A game we played only after the sun went down because darkness was our friend. And speed, oh the joy of running fast at night in the cool air, I can still feel the adrenaline of the speed and derring-do that we all took for granted.

“Home base” was the street light on the corner in front of Ev’s house. It was very, very bright. Very. I don’t know how they slept in his house because of the brightness. The seeker would stand with his head against the light pole and count to 100. Loudly. The hiders would race off to find the darkest hidey hole possible.

The playing area was the entire neighborhood, everyones’ yards were fair game, especially the backyards because they were typically very dark with great hiding places. Imagine sitting on your back porch enjoying a quiet evening and suddenly a group of adrenalin-driven boys is racing through the backyards, one-by-one disappearing into a bush, under a wagon, into a garage, behind a tree, and so on.

Once a hider picked a place, they were not supposed to move, for a short bit. And finding a place was supposed to have been within the seeker’s count of 100. After some amount of time (I don’t remember what), the hiders would try to get back to the light pole which was home base (free) and if they did, they got to be hiders during the next game. Rules!

The seeker would turn around at his 100th count and begin his quest. Seldom did we hide close to the light pole but we did not want to get too far away, the best strategy was to let the seeker walk by your hidey hole and then race him to the pole where you were “free.” If a hider was tagged by the seeker, the hider also became a seeker. The game got louder and louder as seekers continued their quest while at the same time positioning themselves to guard the light pole. We had to be careful of certain yards…they had either low hanging clothes lines or grumpy adults.

In most of the games someone had found an awesome hiding place and the seekers could not find him. We would then all go back to the pole and the first seeker would loudly call, “Olie (O-Lee), Olie, Olson, all in free!” which is an unintentional modification to the traditional “Ollie (ah-lee), Ollie, Oxen free.” Ours was probably the Nordic version. Smile. The unfound, successful hider would come out of the darkness to the accolades of the seekers who wanted to know where he’d hidden. I think we had to tell.

I vividly remember that street light, it was so very bright. We would often gather there, even if we weren’t playing hide and seek. Sometimes, young scalawags from other towns or someplace else would break that light with stones. I’m told.

Once in a while, my mother wanted me to come home before I’d intended to return. She’d lean out the front door and whistle. Yep, my mom would whistle. Not a sports whistle, but a whistle with lips, teeth, and tongue.

That whistle started in the neighborhood on Illinois Avenue where I’d lived through the fourth grade. We had even more kids in the two blocks around us than on 14th Street. Most of us kids were allowed to just go out and play, even at a very young age. I think it’s because we played in packs of girls and boys and we were always in someone’s yard. Most moms did not work so in theory, an adult was always watching us. Some of the moms had developed a unique whistle intended just for their children. When one of those moms wanted their kids to come home, they stand on their front porch and whistle their whistle. When I heard my mom’s I knew to head for home. We also knew the whistles for the other kids so if we heard their whistles, we’d track ‘em down and tell them about their mom’s whistle.

The moms didn’t have that whistle in the “new” neighborhood where we played hide and seek. But, my mom still used it and I still responded. I can still hear that whistle after more than six decades. Clear as a bell.