Hide and Seek
One of my most favorite games as a kid was (is?) hide and seek. Since I usually played it with the same group of people, we put a lot of time and energy into finding the very best places to hide and the best ways to be sneaky about finding people (we always played the variant in which the hiders are allowed to freely move about and change hiding spots). I still remember my two favorite hiding "spots" in my house. The first spot was underneath the dining room table. When all four chairs were tucked in, I could just manage to fit right under the table but on top of the chair seats, such that the tablecloth draped over the edge completely covered me from sight. The second was in the coat closet. We kept our winter boots in there on the floor, and Mom had this one pair of boots that went up to her knees. So I'd put my feet in her boots and then wrap myself in a long coat on one of the hangers, so that anyone who peeked in still just saw a row of boots on the floor and a row of coats along the wall. Oh, and the only reason that I'm revealing these secret locations now is that my body and my feet are too big to squeeze into any of those spots anymore. :)
One thing I remember well about hide and seek is that I highly preferred hiding to seeking. In fact, sometimes when I was "it," I'd simply hide and wait for one of the hiders to walk by as they were changing locations. Ah, that was fun.
I think that this tendency to prefer hiding to seeking has carried over into a lot of the rest of my life. But unfortunately, I don't think that hiding is a good strategy in the real world. It works for a little while, and maybe in some circumstances better than others, but then it just gets lonely. And if I put all of my creative effort into finding good hiding spaces or strategies, I'm probably missing out on a lot of cool opportunities. But in real life, if I'm not hiding, does that imply that I'm seeking? Not necessarily, I suppose. Seeking takes extra extra energy...wonderful! :) And then there's the added worry about what exactly it is that I'm seeking...
I guess that I can't go wrong with the advice in this song (I think the lyrics come from some book or something):
"Seek ye first the kingdom of God
And his righteousness..."
Ack, now I can hear my 3rd grade teacher singing this song...apparently this has been a good night for nostalgia to take root.
posted by Katie @ 12:03 AM
8 Comments:
Hmm, I think a person good at hiding would make an excellent seeker because they know where the best hiding spots are and would look in those places first.
If you wish to practice your seeking skills, just let me know. We can go hunting for a geo-cache. Perhaps, once again, attempt to find that elusive cache located in the nature preserve at MSU. You know, the place with swarms of crazed, blood-thirsty insects.
Unfortunately, I lack the GPS coordinates for heaven. Otherwise, "seeking the kingdom of God" would be a simple matter of following an arrow and letting the satellites guide us.
Good post. I just had to say that the best hiding spot at your house was where we found your Christmas presents hidden one year. Rembember that?! :)
Jon, I'm definitely up for geocaching again sometime! And luckily, those pesky mosquitoes (all 10 bazillion of them) will be gone by now...
I still have the quote by the geocacher who visited that spot a couple of weeks before we did: "Now I have lived near the woods and swamp all my life, but never - NEVER have I seen mosquitoes this bad. Even with repelant, they were all over us. When we got to the cache, there was a swarm of literally hundreds of them, right over the cache..." Hehehe.
Sarah, haha -- that was great! Too bad they were already wrapped. ;) Did I tell you about my newest hobby when I go home? When Mom buys candy for the family, she'll put a bit out on the counter but hide all of the rest so that we don't pig out. Her mistake: she TELLS us (in a very matter-of-fact way) that she has a stash hidden somewhere...somewhere so clever that we'll "never find it." Dad and I take one look at each other and say "Let's go!" We divide up and search the house, and can usually find the candy within a few minutes. It's our new favorite father-daughter activity. :)
Katie,
I always liked hiding better too. Some of my favorite spots were in my bedroom closet or our coat closet, just like you. I also had surprising success just standing behind the bathroom door. It was always open unless someone was using the bathroom, and no one ever thought to check behind it. They would just peek into the bathroom, see that no one was in plain sight, and then leave.
Anyway, the song you mention is actually straight from the Bible. Jesus says those words in Matthew 6:33 during the Sermon on the Mount. The second verse of the song is Matthew 7:7, and the third verse is Matthew 4:4.
lol. I knew about the Bible verses (though I wouldn't be able to name them offhand) -- I was just using the opportunity to harass certain people who shall remain nameless. :)
Hehe oops I guess I missed the joke. I didn't know the verses offhand either, but I happen to be at home with a Bible and a good concordance readily available. ;-)
Gah, now that song is stuff on my brain!
I have to agree with most people here about liking to hide better than find. Heck, I joined a Search and Rescue group because I wanted to learn how to mantrack and, by knowing that, learn how to evade trackers. Granted, I also joined because I like to help people and most of the people, but that just makes the seeking more fun.
Wow, I can't write today.
That should be "*stuck* on my brain" and "like to help people, but"
Post a Comment
<< Home