I worked a basketball game Thursday night and three little kids were playing Red Light-Green Light. Now, granted they were playing under the bleachers. Being an adult now, I had to tell them to stop (heaven forbid one of them falls while running on a green light and their parents sue the school!), but I really wanted to just bring them to an open field and join them.

As a kid, I LOVED Red Light-Green Light! It was so easy! (I wasn't as good at Simon Says. I had to pay attention too much!) Red light means stop and Green light means go. If you get caught going, you have to go back to the beginning. You win when you get all the way to the person yelling Red Light-Green Light and touch them. A great, simple game. I was thinking life should be like Red Light-Green Light. Then I realized, sometimes it is.

I had a crush a few weeks ago. I say had, because rationale set in and I realized I can't really like this person because I don't know them. I called it a crush, because it wasn't even a "He's So Hot" attraction. Just flirting and hence, my labeling it a crush. I explained what had been going on to my friends. They reminded me that just because I worked in a high school, and sometimes revert to a high school "feel" (clothes and music mostly), doesn't mean I have to act like I'm in high school. I was just so confused. One day he'd speak to me and joke around, next day nothing. It was a modern day Red Light-Green Light relationship.

To define, a Red Light-Green Light relationship is one in which you take a few steps forward towards getting to know more about a person. It doesn't matter whether it's flirting, or just opening up, trusting more, etc. Once the person "catches" you moving forward, they close you off, stop talking, joking, etc. and move you all the way back to the beginning. You then begin not talking when you see each other, or maybe only in short phrases. It leaves you to wonder what the heck happened. Just yesterday you two were talking about how you liked your jobs, your family, batting eyes at each other whatever. Today, it's like the amnesia set in. They are friendly enough, but just like they don't even know who you are. Suddenly, you've been dropped straight into the plot of 50 First Dates or Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind.

Eventually you get close to touching the person. One of two things can happen if you are lucky enough to get close. One - the "yeller" gets caught. Then the games starts all over again. Two - the "yeller" doesn't want to get caught and catches you before you touch them, sending you all the way back to the beginning. Usually, when this happens, the "chaser" decideds they don't want to play anymore. Too frustrating to be so close and yet never win. I guess there are other options, like the "yeller" is happy he doesn't have to keep saying "red light. green light." and gets caught and everyone is happy, games are over. I've never seen this really happen before. No one plays games just to give up. (Except maybe parents with their children.)

Red Light-Green Light was such a great game as kids. So were games like Hide-And-Seek, Tag, "war" and Simon Says, but they were games for kids. Maybe we are at fault for teaching our kids to play games where the object is not to get caught. As teenagers and early adults (for lack of a better term I can think of), why are we so afraid of getting caught that we keep sending people back to the beginning?