I had seen him a few moments before, from the vantage point of my first floor window where I was sat working, reasonably diligently. He had walked passed a few times, looking around as if he had lost something.

It slowly became clear to me that the ’something’ that was lost, was in fact himself.

Where I live is technically known as a ‘Court’. I do not know why, but I will admit that it is a slightly unusual layout for about forty residential flats. However, if you know what you are doing (like I do) you can be out of here in a matter of seconds, but this is clearly not the case if you are old.

He tried the large gate at the back, but this is only ever opened for the fire services (just the once in all the time I have been here), so he continued wandering backwards and forwards, looking this way and that.

I watched him for about ten minutes wondering if I should help. Then it struck me. He was merely looking for a place to hide! I do not know why I discounted the possibility that he was playing a game of hide’n’seek just because he is old. That was very prejudicial of me. I am not normally like that. I am very much in favour of equal opportunities when it comes to juvenile behaviour.

You rarely hear people complaining about the social menace that is gangs of old people playing games and causing a general nuisance, and this example showed me why. He was very quiet and was not disturbing anyone. The youth of today could learn a lot from the old people about how to entertain themselves quietly .

Clearly old peoples hide ‘n’ seek is a bit different to the game I used to play. For a start they must count to a really really high number, as he seemed in no particular hurry. Though I suppose when you are retired, time is one thing you have an awful lot of. I was actually quite pleased to see him making the most of this free time. Despite the cold and unpleasant weather. And the rain.

He finally chose to hide by laying down sprawled out, face first, in plain sight, after going down on one knee for the briefest of moments. I have seen enough Spy movies to know that hiding something in plain sight can be an excellent tactic, but the small patch of grass seemed a little conspicuous for my liking. The old person doing the finding would have to have very bad eyesight indeed not to find him immediately, but that was certainly probable.

I wanted to open my window and shout some encouragement to him in the hope he would find a better hiding place, but I felt that would be unfair on the Finder, as it was not my game to influence. So I left him to it. It was not for me to ruin their fun.

Later, I found out that the Court also opens the gates for Ambulances.

No tags