The Games We Used To Play

This is Chapter 33 - The Games We Used To Play - from my upcoming book, “Parkinson’s & Recreation 3 - The No Parkinson’s Zone”

“Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children, play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.”—Fred Rogers

Some of my fondest memories of childhood involve my brothers, my cousins, and the games we used to come up with on the farm. Even though we enjoyed the toys and other “play paraphernalia” that goes with being a child, it was the action of playing with one another that broke any boredom brought on by toys when the “new” wore off! You see, there are only so many ways to relate to a toy, and once you’ve exhausted the possibilities of that toy’s use, what does a kid do? Besides, toys can’t laugh with you or talk with you and people can!

My parents used to play cards with my Aunt Patsy and Uncle Billy Joe, the Wilsons. Once a week or so they would meet at one of our homes (we only lived a mile apart) for Pitch or Pinochle. On those occasions, all my cousins would come over with their parents or we went to their place with ours. Actually, anytime we had an excuse to get together was another opportunity to play with our cousins. Holidays, birthdays, and Sunday-after-church get-togethers were the times we looked most forward to because they afforded the most possible play time (besides summer break)!

Along with the Wilsons who lived so near, the Raglands (Aunt Annie) lived only 3 miles away in Boynton. This meant that along with me and my brothers (Paul, Bob, and Sam), our Wilson cousins (Danny Joe, Donna Sue, Diana Marie, Patty Ann, Billy Wayne ) and our Ragland cousins (Earnie and Tommy), we had enough people to play just about anything. I also want to point out that we always called the Wilson kids by their first and middle names...and the only time the Jernigans or Raglands ever got called by their first and middle names was when we got in trouble!

After the tornado demolished our barn, we had a concrete slab (the barn floor) on which to play basketball. For winter basketball games, we had a goal that I fashioned from scrap metal mounted in our barn and the Wilsons had a real goal mounted in theirs. In the front yard, beside the giant mulberry tree, was our baseball and football field. Usually, the younger children did not play basketball or football with us because we played pretty roughly. But, that didn’t stop the girls from joining us! Donna and Diana were just as tough as we were. And, generally, Donna and I could beat Danny and Paul in basketball (even though they might dispute that statement, it is the truth)!

During football, we sometimes let the younger children play. But, without fail, they would wind up getting hurt and running with tears in their eyes (and usually screaming at the top of their lungs) to their mamas! Most often, that child was Tom, Billy Wayne, or Sam—just sayin’!

Baseball was fun for a couple of reasons. One, because we didn’t have enough players for two complete teams, we would divide the teams among those available, which also meant that Danny Joe and I always had to be the two team captains because we were the oldest. In other words, we had to choose up sides! Danny always chose Paul and I always chose Donna.

Second, we had to adopt some new rules for our games. If you hit the ball over the fence beside the highway, you were automatically called “out”. If you hit the ball under the fence by the roping pen (the center field fence beyond the pear tree) you could only take two bases. If you hit the ball over that fence, you got an automatic home run. If you only had three members on your team, and in the course of your turn at bat you were all three stuck on base, what could you do? According to our rules, you had two options. One was to have a forced “goose chase”! The runner on third base had to run when the third baseman threw the ball to his team mate at home plate. If he was lucky enough to avoid being hit by the ball and somehow make it home, he got to bat! The other option was for the outfield team to choose one player to throw the ball really high, high enough to give the third base runner a chance to run home. And again, lucky was the one who judged the height of the ball and made it home before the “thrower” could catch the ball and tag him or throw him “out”!

Another form of baseball we loved was a game called “Work-Up”, since it could be played with just a few players. In Work-Up, each field position was assigned an order in which to bat. When one person got a hit or was called “out”, the person next in the order moved up in line (changing field position) and the previous batter moved to the last position in the batting or field order. Another way to get to bat was to catch a fly ball. Whenever this occurred, the batter and the one who caught the ball simply switched places.

Whenever we exhausted the normal games children play (like baseball, basketball, and football), we generally came up with a game of our own making or relied on the memories of our parents (mostly our mother’s memories!) to help us come up with a new game. One of the games my mother taught us was called “Annie Over”. This game required both skill and intuition, along with some sort of ball that could be caught bare-handed and, of course, a house or some other structure to throw the ball over!

The person with the ball stood on one side of the house while all the other players stood on the other. The side with the ball would cry out, “Annie!” to which the lone player would answer, “Over!” At this time, the ball would be thrown over the house to the single player. If the ball was dropped or not caught the player with the ball would yell, “Annie!” and resume the game. If the ball was caught, the player would run around the house and surprise the other team. His job was then to throw the ball and hit an opposing player. That player was then on his side! Intuition came into the mix whenever the team which had just thrown the ball tried to guess if the ball had been caught and, if so, which way the runner would be coming after them! The scary part was when the team which caught the ball would split up and run from both directions! You had to quickly decide who had the ball and run as fast as you could away from them. Of course, another option (called cheating) was to post spies at the house corners to tell us if the person caught the ball and which way they were coming!

One of our favorite games of all time was called “Hill-Dill-Dill”. I have no idea where we learned it! We probably just made it up! We played this game in the front yard, either at our house or at the Wilson’s (or anywhere there was at least a little room for running). One player was “it” and stood at the opposite end of the playing field guarding the goal line we had to cross to be safe from him. Everyone else stood at the other end of the field. The object of the game was to avoid being tackled by the person who was “it”.

Here’s how you play: When everyone is ready, “it” would chant, “Hill-dill-dill! Come over the hill before I catch you standing still!” At that point, everyone would run towards the opposite goal. If you made it across without being tackled, you had another chance to try again. If you were caught and tackled, you became “it”, along with anyone else who was “it”! The younger and slower children always got caught first. Sometimes, Danny Joe would try to catch Paul or Donna first so they would have a better chance of catching me! That’s right, I was always the last one caught! Again, my brothers and cousins may dispute this, but deep in their hearts they know I am the all-time champion of Hill-Dill-Dill!

We also had games we played at our swimming hole, Shale Pit. Since Shale Pit was a former rock quarry, there were several deep trenches which left rows of tiny islands to swim between. The water was usually very clear and had patches of long green “moss” (some kind of pond weed) growing from the bottom. Much like Hill-Dill-Dill, we played a game we called “Shark”. The shark person was on one island and the people he was after were on another. When the shark counted to five everyone had to jump into the water and swim to the other side, or “island”. The idea was to swim as deep as possible and go through the moss to elude the shark. If he caught you under water, you still had a chance. The goal was for the shark to catch you above water and dunk you! Just as in Hill-Dill-Dill, when caught, you were on the side of “it” (the shark) until everyone was caught. And, I’m pretty sure I was the all-time Shark champion, too.

Many were the days we spent on horseback. We even used our horses in many of our games. From War, to Cowboys and Indians, our horses were an integral part of our lives. The Wilsons had the best places for Hide-and-Seek. What made this game so much fun was that we played on horseback! We had two variations of this game. The first variation was for everyone to be on their horses and to hide with their horses. This wasn’t quite as difficult as it may sound. Since the Wilson’s land was covered with trees and brush and because there were many ravines, creeks, and gullies in which to ride, it was not difficult to conceal even a horse and rider.

The other variation was for everyone except “it” to be on foot. The only person on horseback was the “it” person! I remember one time in the fall when Donna and I were hiding together and Lory Myers (a family friend) was “it”. We decided we would hide under the fallen leaves in one of the gullies. As Lory’s horse approached, we became afraid that we would be trampled! But when the horse came too close for comfort we jumped up and spooked Lory’s horse! After Lory finally stopped the horse she didn’t want to be “it” anymore!

Another time, everyone had been found except Diana. We hunted and hunted but to no avail. Everyone who had been found was now on horseback, but still, Diana was nowhere in sight. Finally, as sundown approached, Diana comes waltzing in. She had been hiding up a tree! She laughed and laughed because we had all ridden right beneath her hiding place several times! She attributed our failure to find her to her brilliant disguise, one which I will never forget! She was wearing jean shorts, bikini top, head scarf and sunglasses. She looked like a wild country version of Greta Garbo!

Our favorite nighttime game was one we called “Spotlight”, which is really just another form of Hide-and-Seek. Spotlight was played with flashlights. After everyone had gone into hiding (anywhere on the farm), the “it” person would set out to find everyone else. The way one was caught was to have the light spot them and then to be identified correctly! This game always seemed to go on forever because of the difficulty in finding someone at night. It was much easier to find a new hiding place when you heard “it” approaching. The way we remedied not being able to find someone was to yell out loudly, “Make a noise or I quit!” This was a legal tactic for “it” to use, and always made the game more interesting, because of the variety of weird noises that would begin coming out of the darkness at you from everywhere!

From these games I’ve just described to the ones like sliding down the pond bank on card board, or rolling down the hill in Sapulpa at Grandad and Grandma Johnson’s each Christmas, to whatever else we could come up with, these games have left an indelible impression on my mind because of all the memories that I have been left with to enjoy. My cousins and brothers are all grown now, but the memories are sweet to savor.

Now, we get to enjoy seeing our own children play the games of their childhood and, in a sense, we get to relive our memories once again through them. Who knows? After all these memories you might just hear one of us yelling out at the next family get-together, “Hill-dill-dill! Come over the hill before I catch you standing still!” or “Make a noise or I quit!” It’s good to know one is never too old to play the games of his childhood on the playing fields of his or her memories...

Dennis Jernigan

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