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The stay-at-home dad: Hide and seek not a tournament of champions

by TYLER WILSON/Coeur Voice contributor
| December 8, 2021 1:00 AM

Adults love open-concept homes. The space. The flow. It hits all the right buttons for the average HGTV viewer.

Avid hide-and-seekers, however, prefer a home with abundant nooks and crannies.

My house falls into the open-concept category. I can’t complain about the size because it wasn’t the house’s decision to have four kids.

The house could provide some decent hiding spots, if not for the fact that the six slobs who live there can’t seem to get rid of anything. Of the few decent hiding spots, many of them are just behind random piles of stuff that shouldn’t be there in the first place.

Despite a lackluster map, my four kids have been playing hide-and-seek quite a bit lately. I appreciate any time they choose an off-screen activity, and while they don’t make me hide my giant butt anywhere around the house, I wish they wouldn’t implicate me in their deceptions.

For one, the seeker is always trying to get me to reveal the location of the other kids.

Kid: “Dad, did you see where they are hiding?”

Me: “It’s not seeking if you just ask me where they are.”

Kid: “Okay, but did you see them hide anywhere around here?”

I can see why they ask, because at least one kid every game wants me to hide them behind my chair or under a blanket on my lap.

They’re all too big to hide behind a chair or under a blanket on my lap.

I only consider one of my kids, my four-year-old son, to be a size in which it's comfortable for me to have him sitting on my lap for more than 30 seconds.

The kid under the blanket elbows me 95 times or I get kicked in the back 95 times from behind the chair.

Whenever the seeker asks me where they are, the hiders giggle and reveal themselves, then get mad at me for “not hiding them well enough.” I’m not playing!

My middle kids, ages 6 and 8, do occasionally find creative ways to hide themselves throughout the house. They’ll find some basket or box, then cover themselves with toys and blankets, creating what seems to be just another pile of junk amongst the several other piles of junk. My 8-year-old son sometimes just bails and heads out to the backyard, despite the other kids making it clear that outside hiding places are off-limits. We might all see him a half-hour later, after he dug a hole or threw a pile of rocks or whatever he likes to do out there.

My 4-year-old, because of his age, still just plops himself under the kitchen table or behind the couch with his legs sticking out for everyone to see. The other kids at least wait a little while before they point him out.

My 10-year-old, however, has no excuse for her terrible hiding places. Recently she tried standing behind the Christmas tree, which is not what anyone would consider a robust hunk of plastic. She hides behind beds (not under them, because of all the junk, obviously) with her legs sticking out the side just like the 4-year-old behind the couch. She’s a little too big for the game, I guess.

Honestly, I’m not sure if anyone in the house actually likes to play hide-and-seek, because I’ve noticed how they tend to initiate these games around bedtime, then, for some reason, take forever to hide and then seek out the participants.

Kid: “Dad, I can’t find anyone.”

Me: “It’s time for bed. Just go brush your teeth.”

Kid: “No, I better make sure I find everyone and let them know it’s time to brush our teeth.”

Then nobody shows up to brush their teeth for at least 25 minutes. At bedtime, every kid seems to have developed a remarkable disappearing act.

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Tyler Wilson is a freelance writer and stay-at-home dad to four kids, ages 4-10. He is tired. He can be reached at twilson@cdapress.com.