Playing Ninja

On a night like this sometime around 1982 after much pleading and explaining our parents let us go out after dark and my neighbor Mike and maybe his little brother Matt (although I can't be sure if he was there) dressed all in black and played "Ninjas" in the black cool night of our seaside neighborhood. We lived on a circle by a pond, the spaces between the houses filled with well known bushes, trees, paths and forts. We crept about in the dark and didn't do much really, but I do remember that we felt like we could do anything. The realities of fourth grade, long division and tiered reading groups faded into complete non-importance as we climbed trees in the quiet night and hid from each other until one of our mother's voices broke the spell. Their familiar call ringing into our secret world and reminding us that it was time to return to our homes to brush our teeth and put on our pajamas. I hadn't thought about those nights in a while. Those were great nights. The end of the summer so near and all of us so clearly sure we could resist the inevitable coming of school days and bus rides if only armed only with our imaginations and a set of black sweat pants and face paint.

Tonight as I stepped outside and took a deep breath of the fresh night air that memory came into me so vivid and pure. It made me smile. They say that smell is the strongest form of memory and I believe it. The stresses of life, our jobs, our relationships and the omni-oppressive future that goads us to continue our adult journeys can be so consuming that we forget. At least I forget. I forget that if I really want to be, I can be a Ninja, invisible to the real world and fueled perhaps only by my desire to resist and my willingness to believe.

We are what we want to be. The obstacles we face can be overcome, surpassed and learned from. The only real limits are the ones we place on ourselves. I don't think that I cared then that my older brother thought it was stupid to play "ninjas" or that the other kids might not have understood. I don't recall ever trying to explain it to anyone or get their support. We just did it. Now, so many years later, I still remember how good it felt to be out there in the world after dark and concerned with no one else. I am annoyed with myself for allowing so many other things to influence my decisions and choices. It is only I, in this quiet night, who I look to for the answers and I guess I just needed reminding that I am the one who can answer them.

It's very simple, I know. But lately all of my epiphanies have been about understanding simple things I would swear to you that I already knew. Maybe I could stand to spend less time knowing everything and more time playing Ninja.