from tag #29

But kids argue about whether there was an actual tag. Do you have to feel the tag to be tagged? What if someone tags your hair? Sometimes a kid will lie. Sometimes a kid will get desperate and say that shoes don’t count. Or someone will invent a “safe” that was not agreed upon beforehand.

Sometimes I have been “safe,” which means kids would crash into me suddenly. My playground-watching days were brief, and I never decided to run from the kid who was running toward me as a safe. That would have been fun. But I liked being safe. I liked kids crashing into me.

Tag is probably common because chasing is a basic animal thing to do.