Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
The Super Secret Hideout Fort
If you were anything like me growing up, one of your main modes of play with friends was identifying your super secret hideout, or at least get busy building one. Some of them were out in plain sight; no one was duped as to where you were playing. But other times, you might have managed to find a nifty clearing under low-hanging branches of a tree, or a little wooded area, or an old structure. These hideouts were often unsafe, of course. And although you talked it up often with friends who weren’t in on the secret location, most people over the age of twelve didn’t care a fig where you were playing, as long as you were quiet and stayed out of their way. Hideouts were good for that.
When I was seven, we commonly referred to a special location, which we believed was known to only an initiated few, as a “secret hiding place.” We built ours along one side of our house, next to the swing set on top of a large cement platform that covered the septic tank. I know what you’re asking: where was the supervision? They were glad to stay cool indoors, absorbed in their own tasks. The children could climb trees, launch off swings, and build secret hiding places on the septic tank with panels of sharp tin roofing as long as they played outdoors. There might be a ruptured kidney here and there, but that came with the territory.
The building of that hiding place was one of the most satisfying projects I had ever undertaken. I don’t know how it looked to an adult eye; surely ramshackle, perhaps not even really recognizable as a structure. Maybe it looked like a collection of roofing and other materials piled on the septic tank. But in my mind, I had created a building. I could enter and sit inside a structure I had assembled with my own hands. And sitting is probably about all we could do in that cramped space. Surely it was fragile, my parents not having offered me hammer and nails, and we must have baked in there under the tropical Thailand sun.
My fantasy of being a multi-skilled adult continued when I decided to plant a garden next to our hiding place. I knew nothing about gardening, but what was there to know? All you had to do was put some seeds in the ground, water them, and enjoy the neat rows of plants that would spring from the fertile soil. So I planted papaya and a few other seeds. It turns out that, probably given its location, that soil was fertile. I was surprised to find a fresh young papaya tree one day, right where I had expertly sown my seeds. I immediately argued with the hired house helper. She maintained that she had planted it. I knew it had been me; I was responsible for this slender, promising plant. My work would result in more green papaya salads at lunch. What else would one expect to happen when one had planted seeds?
Probably the strangest hideout was one I found with a handful of other girls’ dorm residents at boarding school. Having a shared secret location was a welcome break from the tension, bickering, and competition that comes when you put ten pre-teen girls together for more than just an overnight birthday party. I don’t know how we found it, because I don’t remember straying from that contentious household very often. We must have been on a rare bike ride when we came to a gravel lot with several odd wood and metal structures of different shapes. Their function was utterly unknown to us. The best that we could do was guess that these had been parts of trains. But they were great fun to climb on—imagine an unconventional fast food play area, except with more potentially dangerous falls and with patches of tar or oil to look out for. Whoever ran such a playground would pay a high premium for insurance.
The place was actually not hidden at all, but we didn’t mind. We would often climb up on a long, cylindrical structure and let our legs dangle down into a compartmented interior. We could also jump down inside and clamber through the circular openings in the metal walls dividing the sections. We were quite inaccessible to those not experienced in navigating the place. One day, some friendly Thai school girls came to talk to us. We invited them up, and it seems like one of them had an incident, partly falling through some boards that had been laid across some of the openings that stretched along the length of the cylinder. A staff member at our boarding school, too, someone I didn’t know well, encountered trouble when invited up. If memory serves, he nearly ruined his clothes. While not up to the standard of innocent joy my septic tank hideout had offered, this industrial jungle gym was an intriguing escape from our daily squabbles over dresses, sticker collections, and who knows what else.
When our family moved to the States, I noticed that secret hiding places were “forts” in the local lingo, especially in Pennsylvania. Although I helped build some forts out of snow, the appeal of having a privileged hiding spot had mostly faded for me. I was on to other interests, like serious four square tournaments at recess, great sledding hills, and just coping with junior high. But when my daughters moved a large portion of their doll accessories into a passage between walls in the loft, I didn’t protest. Neither did I intervene when my younger daughter set to work in that tight space—organizing, putting in flooring, hanging up original works. It might be dusty, there could be mice. But at least there were no hazardous drops, and definitely no tar.
Published in General
Nice slice of life.
I too, dwelt in forts. One winter, my friends and I and my brother went into the woods with hatchets. Chopped trees down and notched them. log cabin style. We drug the feld trees with ropes like mules. This was on Andrews AFB in Maryland. It was erected tall enough to stand in and we scrounged plywood for a roof. Now that was a Fort !
Thank you for reviving that memory.
That is fun to know that little girls in Thailand were also building “secret hideouts” like we created in Wyoming. It is obviously a kid thing…We made some from hay bales in the barn loft, and we made them with blankets over kitchen chairs where my mom had put them in the living room so she could scrub and wax the floor in the kitchen. We had a really fun one next to the fence, right under the lilac tree that draped over us. We’d serve “tea” (water) in our toy cups, with the dog lying on the grass watching out for us. It seems to be a natural thing to create a hiding place/secret fort when you’re a kid.
If they’d had any inkling of your project, your parents were probably wondering how to get you to work that hard on your regular chores.
My older brother was good with hideouts. He made a couple of huts out of palm leaves that were very nifty—a tourist would have paid good money to sit in one and sip cold drinks. But then my dad decided he didn’t want any more fronds torn off the trees—imagine that.
Historical note: My sister, @nicegrizzly , actually did rupture her kidney when she fell off a tree limb onto her back. Things were dicey for awhile, but we’re glad she’s still around.
Hah! Our fort was two story. I have no idea where we got the building materials. But we had nails driven in to accept rubber bands so that we could shoot paper wads at any approaching girls.
Oh yes! The no boys allowed thing was common with us.
I can imagine the pain she must have been in!
I grew up roaming the scrub oak, aspen, and pine trees on the side of a mountain. I can’t recall how old I was when I stopped building huts and forts. We were always building things out of branches and rocks.
Or the leftover bricks from building our house. The bricks were a blessing and a nemesis. My youngest brother got stung by a swarm of bees that built their hive in the pile. We used the bricks for all kinds of stuff. But if we were ever found bored, Mom would tell us to move the brick pile from one end of the yard to the other. No one EVER volunteered to move the brick pile.
We also had a cabin about two hours away. We had lots of hideouts there. The most common place was under the stairs that lead to the large loft. The only way you could get there was sliding between the slats. They were carpeted, but it gave me a lifelong fear of the spaces between stairs!
Going to the parks in New Delhi, India with our Ayah (Nanny) in India was an adventure. There were small abandoned temples overgrown with vines, and plants. Perfect places for imagined adventures.
There was only one girl in our neighborhood, and I think she was welcome, so our defensive preparations went for nought.
Us too with the leftover bricks. We played with those constantly.
A friend’s father had an old bread truck or some such. It was one of our forts.
I could go on and on. Living in a parsonage next to a church that had rooms within rooms, with 40 acres, a creek, and old farm outbuildings for the pastor’s cow, horse and chickens, gave plenty of possibilities. And it didn’t begin or end there. But, alas, no time for it now. It’s fun to read what others say, though.
Yes, my brothers were pros at those! Only, it was always spitwads.
Forts that don’t spend adequate resources on defense are soon overrun by feminine hordes. I’m pretty sure history backs me up here.
I would note in passing that once schools successfully eliminate the binary concept of gender, our nation’s children will probably all die of the cooties we avoided.
Sad.
We made our tree house in Ft. Worth two story by pitching an old tent on top of it. Fun times. We never needed organized sports as we either instigated pick up games of baseball/football in the neighborhood or just found ways to amuse ourselves.
When I was way to young a neighborhood girl and I discovered a very unique evergreen tree in an empty lot.It’s branches were very dense and came all the way to the ground. If it rained water didn’t penetrate nor did much sunlight. We could actually stand next to the trunk. You could not see us in there. I swear it was her idea to play doctor. What an education! BTW that was almost 65 years ago.
What a wonderful post!
When I was a kid in the middle of nowhere, I had a secret grotto. It was near the creek, and small and shady and uniquely mine. It was not as if I was hiding from hordes – nobody but family lived there anyway. I never, later in life, had anything to match it.
When I moved to Maryland, we built the kids a fort. They basically never used it. Instead, they eventually built their own – a two story wonder with scuppers and spud cannon went up just last summer. It has electricity and lights!
If you look carefully, you can see a steel zip line – they built that, too. A 250′ downhill run.
Were you able to pick up the shattered pieces of your life after the…incident?
It sounds as if your parents were somewhat negligent!😉
I’ve never been the same. I didn’t mention that she went on to be a real doctor while I just became a lousy PHCheese. The whole story is incredible and I’ll never tell.
Then you, too, are a victim.
<sniff>
It’s been a fine victim hood.
And the damage continues as we are all triggered through hearing about it.
It occurs to me that if boys would just stay in the fort, they would be safe from girls. But no, they venture out and get picked off one-by-one.
We had a Gravenstein apple tree that grew in depression near our house when I was a kid. The branches enclosed The Secret Place. It didn’t matter that even my parents called it The Secret Place and knew exactly where it was.
Forts were numerous in the field behind our house, holes dug in the ground, covered with plywood with sod on the top to camouflage them. I still remember when I caught one of my friends in the forehead with a shovel while digging one. A few stitches and life went on.