From the ages of three to six, me and some of my neighbours had a war, three girls against three boys. On the girls team we had Kelsey, Vianna and myself. On the boys team there was Kevin, Ferris, and Troy. I was the youngest of the group and was determined to keep up with the others. We had many daringly crazy adventures throughout these years but one of my all time favorites would have to be the day I was two inches off the ground. It was the sparkly cheetahs against the fierce flying ferraris. You may be confused as to what this means so allow me to explain.

It was summertime and a stunningly beautiful sunny day in Michigan. I was woken up at seven a.m. by my older sister who was jumping on my bed like it was a trampoline, grinning like a madman, which she was.

Immediately, I knew she had to be up to something. I dragged myself out of bed and was pushed out the door. Waiting for us was Vianna with four  bottles of spray paint. Now, I was extremely confused but I stopped complaining when I was handed a spray can of pink paint, my favorite color.  We headed down our calm, quiet street, waving to a few neighbors we saw in their yards.

“Kelsey…...” I whined “What are we doing...? I wanna go watch full house!”

“Be quiet. You’ll see in a minute. Just hold on.”, Kelsey stated with a knowing  smile.

“Ok…., but this better be good,” I said with reluctance.

All that could be seen was green. Beautiful lush green forests and grass so green it looked artificial, it swallowed the quaint neighbourhood whole. There were freshly paved roads, smooth and comfortingly predictable. One could hear cars breathe a sigh of relief when entering our subdivision after coming off the harsh Michigan roads that were holier than swiss cheese. We were headed back, deep into the woods next to the common area and that is when I saw it, the boys’ fort.

The fort was a large tree shaped like an open palm, warm and inviting. They had painted large letters on the tree in puke green paint “Boys ONLY fort. NO girls allowed,” Yuck, it was the grossest thing I had ever seen, I thought. Looking at the paint cans and back at the tree, a small mischievous smile appeared on my face. Now, I knew what we were here for and what we needed to do. We took out the spray paint and in large letters wrote on the tree “THE GIRLS ROOM. NO BOYS ALLOWED!”, multiple times. This came from our favorite show “The Amanda Show”. Vroom! We shot down the road like rockets, going as fast as we could because we knew the boys would be arriving to the fort to scheme up a plan soon. We could see my house, the finish line, just down the street and we started to race at lightning speed. With the wind blowing through our hair, the burn starting to make our legs ache, and our breathing become harder as our lungs tried to catch up. It was the feeling of freedom.

Troy’s parents yelled out “They know! You better run home quickly.”

We all yelled a quick “Thanks!”, and kicked it up another notch.

We realized the first place they would come to look for us would be our house. Vianna and Ferris are brother and sister so we couldn’t hide at her house either. We jumped in our barbie jeep like we were criminals on a high speed chase, and rode off into the sunset. We made it to the cul de sac in front of my house when we were road blocked by the boys, looking as threatening and as impassable as a barbed-wire fence. We were forced to stop the jeep. This is when Troy came over and raised the jeep off the ground just enough that we couldn’t drive away. They knew that we were as fast as cheetahs but as timid as mice. Of course, all the boys were super impressed and everyone was cheering Troy on for raising us two inches off the ground. However, we planned, we arrived, and we conquered the boys’ tree fort. That is what was important to us girls and we couldn’t wipe the conniving smirks off our faces, even as they pelted us with beebee guns. Shrieking like the little girls we were, we took off and the chase started all over again. Running to our parents to hide behind them, the boys were moaning and groaning to twist the story in their favor. How rude! They’re such tattlers and cowards , I thought while hiding behind my dad’s leg. And so summer vacation continued.

This past summer, Kelsey and I had a pool party at our house and invited all the old neighbours. We have all grown up and moved out, so we haven’t really kept in contact. Yet one of the stories the boys wanted to tell while sitting around the dinner table was reminiscing about the time we were lifted “so far” off the ground. I guess there are two sides to every story. I realized in this moment that the thing I loved most in life was being able to have fun and spend time with the people I care about. Because of this realization I had at a young age, I have spent a lot of my life with my favorite people and the ones that create the best memories.