Summer Fun 1965

Summer Fun 1965



         

Childhood games never forgotten, playing all day in the park under the scorching sun.  What did we care, no sunblock just the sun burning the bare skin exposed from our tank tops and shorts.  Shoulders redden leaving behind the markings of a hot summer's afternoon.  Running through the tall blades of grass, almost reaching the heavens.  No air blowing, throats thirsty wanting to be quenched but the game was too intense, summer fun ninety-sixty five.
Running away from each other, sneaking through and by the grass in slow motion.
Hiding and once in awhile poking our heads out to see who was close.  Fine tuning our ears to elaborate on whose footsteps where close. We roamed in circles for hours not letting the hot sun or the perspiration on our bodies give up.
Then suddenly out of the blue....Tag you're it!
My turn to find my friends hiding behind the tall marsh that led to the baseball field.  I remove my shoes and run about barefoot a trick I learn from Johnny.  He was the one that was hardly  “tagged you're it”.  Only because he didn't wear shoes and he slithered like a snake, never heard.  I watched for the shaking of the long plants in different hues of green.  There to the east I see movement and I smell the perspired arm pit of one of the guys..... Sneaking behind him I yell “you're it”
Hey, no fair I'll here as the runner gets caught.  I would answer can handle the best at the game huh.  Those were the times when good friends got together on a scorching hot summer's afternoon without a bottle of cold water, stopping at nothing to have a fun day.
I'm sure you remember the counting while covering your eyes with your hands, pressing your face against a tree.  The chosen count was one hundred. Imagine counting to a hundred now: could go have lunch and come back and still, eighty-nine...ninety, etc.  Poor kid, but that was the count number so be it!
When it was my turn to count and since I was the only girl playing in the group I was allowed to count by tens unless one of my little girlfriends happened to join in, that a whole different story.
Memories that will never be forgotten, the tall blades of grass brushing against our dirty faces, dry throats, sunburned lips and reddened skin all the suffering and pain in the name of fun.....tag you're it!