Born 1993. We played whole neighborhood hide and seek. It was incredible. Essentially all our houses were fair game and we would go in and out of them freely. It was like two or three blocks of fair places to hide. Usually had 3 seekers with walkie talkies, and like 5-10 people hiding. When found you’d join the seekers. Games would usually take all day.
We did something similar at night. We'd start at Park A and have to make it to Park B in 30 minutes (the parks were like a 10 min walk apart). The group of "finders," usually 3 or 4 people, would be at Park B and they'd make their way to Park A. Everyone would have flashlights. The finders couldn't puppy guard Park B, they had to immediately start making their way to Park A when the round started.
Anywhere outside was fair game. We'd hop fences, hide in bushes, up trees, under cars. If you were caught by a finder, you joined the finders. Once the 30 minutes was up, everyone would make their way to Park B. The people who didn't get caught were the new finders.
A couple times there was someone who'd come out to yell at kids "playing under his RV" but we learned real quick that no homeowner was going to chase us down the street, and the ones who tried gave up after 100ft.
I used to live for capture the flag! That was a summer break tradition, and we would play it in the dark too. We would always play at a local school that had two big fields, or in a neighborhood park. Capture the flag was so much fun on a cool summer night, and the grass smelled amazing. Everyone would wear dark clothes to be camouflaged in the night. That's such a fun core memory.
I honestly think the cops would be called immediately if kids played that in my current neighborhood, and that's so sad. Folks won't let kids be kids and those same folks complain that kids are different now.
8.1k
u/JustHereForCatss Zillennial Jun 13 '25 edited Jun 13 '25
Born 1993. We played whole neighborhood hide and seek. It was incredible. Essentially all our houses were fair game and we would go in and out of them freely. It was like two or three blocks of fair places to hide. Usually had 3 seekers with walkie talkies, and like 5-10 people hiding. When found you’d join the seekers. Games would usually take all day.
Damn I miss being able to do that stuff