Essentially, from the time I was about three months old, I was on a class roster. And from the time I was able to walk, I’ve been consciously trying to get off that roster. As luck would have it, I had a partner in crime. A girl named Sarah. She was one of those kids whose mom would French braid her hair and put bows in it. I mean don’t get me wrong, I was a cute kid, but more in that hair in knots, pants on crooked kind of way. Nevertheless, we made a good team.
During outdoor playtime, we’d scope out escape routes. We stored detailed, crayon drawn, miniature maps in the toes of our shoes. Occasionally we’d practice jumping the 3-foot fences that enclosed the playground. We had to make sure that it wasn’t a day that Sarah got dressed in overalls as she had a tendency to get stuck. I’ve had many interpretations of this behaviors, my therapist of course suggested it had to do with wanting to get attention and wanting to be close to my parents. The most interesting guess happened during one of those pseudo intellectual times in college. This guy suggested it was my Jewish heritage that was causing me to always want to runaway and hide.
Now this running away thing wasn’t a passing fancy. Finally, after about 10 years of attempts, Sarah and I actually pulled it off. One summer we were enrolled in a Dutch National Team soccer camp hosted by the local high school. I think it was called “Winning Mood.” After so many years of misfires, I was surprised at how easy it turned out to be. Apparently what our previous plans had been missing, was a good lie. Basically, we just told the coaches we had to go home early. That’s it. Not fully understanding English or the litigious nature of the United States, they let us go. We felt as if we had won all the events at the Olympic Games. Freedom was ours! We road our bikes to the local park and contemplated the gravity of it all. For the first time in our lives, we were calling the shots. We were on our own roster!
