As a kid, I always was heavily into playing sports. Any sport. I didn’t mind. As a grown up, other easier distractions like watching a movie, or talking to someone you enjoy talking to, or drinking, or reading or listening to music get in the way of the 14 year old boy-life. But as a kid, all these distractions were vapor. It was just impossible for someone to suggest such a non-boy activity and expect me to forego a sport. But, even then, there were obstacles. Girls for example. We had a few sweet(ish) girls around where I lived, who used to come to ‘play’ with us. Now ‘play’ for 12 year old girls means something totally different from what it means for guys. Yet, being the sweet kid I was, I sometimes ‘played’ with the girls too. Their games were more like hide and go seek, or Sunday Monday Tuesday types. Quite kiddish, but I could see how those games too could be enjoyed.

So this one time, around 12 of us were playing hide and go seek. There was the guy who was the denner or "it". As soon as his counting began, I ran to a super-awesome place that I knew. I knew I would win the game if I just hid there. There was about zero chance of me being found. As I sat there, perched between a tree branch and the edge of a balcony, about 15 feet from the ground, I saw the other kids being smoked out of their lame-ass hiding places. I was all smug, scoffing at their weak attempts. Soon, everyone was found and I was the only one remaining. For a few mins, I could hear how I was suddenly the expert hider that nobody could get the better of. I was gloating on my tree. I was the hide and seek hero, so to say. I felt like I had won. But I had to keep this place a secret. So I had to wait till they all moved away from where I was, so that I could then do a “Tada!!!” entry from around the corner and be proclaimed super-hider, officially. But that didn’t happen. The stupid kids just continued to hang out below the tree. Soon, they began discussing random topics- TV shows, stories from school, plans for the holidays, computer games. What the fuck! I was still to be discovered and these loser kids had already given up and moved on. Soon, the "it" too joined their discussions and the hide and seek game just fizzled out. Just like that. Now I had absolutely no incentive of climbing down. The moment had passed and I didn’t want the hiding place to become known. So I continued to sit tight. Then it got dark, and they began to disperse. Soon, there was no one left.

I climbed down, pissed off with the way this whole shit had gone. What a waste of an evening. Sitting in a tree doing nothing. All because I was good at what I was doing and the rest of them weren’t focused. I just went home, had dinner and watched some TV. And swore to myself that I would not play any gay games after that.

Now, years later, I have learned my lesson from that evening. I realize now, that in life it’s rarely about whether or not you want to play hide and seek. Sometimes, life will make you hide, even though you may not want to. And the onus of being discovered and sought out in time, lies with you. For if you obsess too much about winning, you will just stay there, hidden, sitting on the proverbial tree watching everyone else who has apparently lost, get on with their lives. Because when everyone loses, losing suddenly becomes the new winning. The world is full of denners who would rather go home and accept they weren’t good enough, than doggedly seek you out because they made a commitment to themselves when they took that den.

As unfair as it may sound, you have to decide if you want to hide so well that no one can find you, ever. Or if you want to have a life at the cost of being sought out. But I can tell you, if you hide and no one seeks you out, life will suck much, much more. You will eventually grovel and beg to be found. To be discovered. To be noticed. To lose the game. Just so you can live.