Not only did we believe in ghosts as kids, we played with them. They ran the bases for us in our 2-2 or 3-3 baseball games in Bovina. In Iowa , when the cousins played tag at our grandparents’ farm, the “it” kid was the ghost.

The four oldest cousins on my mom’s side are 13 months apart in age and represented far flung states: Idaho, Iowa and NY. Our two Virginia cousins and a second Iowa and second Idaho cousin are a few years younger. The youngest, for a long time, is the third boy in the Idaho family. The very youngest of the 10 of us, who lives in WA, is the same age as my nephew.

Whatever configuration of cousins made it ”back to the farm” – the Idaho family raised racehorses, which made getting away difficult — would play, “Ghostie, Ghostie are you out tonight.”

It was a simple game of tag. We ran one circuit around the farmhouse and were safe as soon as we touched the sidewalk in front of the house, where the moths committed hari-kari and the mosquitoes snacked on the Morfitt clan kids.

It’s amazing how long two minutes can last. First you had to avoid the clothesline. We were short enough not to be garroted by the plastic covered wire, but running into the stout posts or my grandmother’s school bell, which hung from one post, was a real possibility in the pitch black night.

The second hazard was my sister. She loved to hide as a kid: under piles of leaves, between boulders, behind trees. We’d be playing and she’d disappear. And reappear, never admitting she had hidden. “I was right there; you just didn’t see me.”

She has crazy good night vision, is very fast and enjoys scaring people. If the CIA had a Special Ops tag division, Deborah Bellinghausen, “The Leopard”, would be a legend.

“Do you remember that time she swam up behind Boris, the KGB agent, and he was so surprised he spit out his snorkel and swallowed sea water, so she had to first rescue him and then tow him a mile in a lifeguard hold through rough surf. He tried to alligator roll her and she yanked on his arm pit hairs the way she taught us. He didn’t dare move after that!”

“I know, and as soon as she handed Boris over, she had a quick snack of sardines and cashews, swallowed some hot coffee and then ran down a team of bad guys that had a half day head-start on her. It’s like she had steel springs in her legs…”

As a 10 year old, she’d reach out from the shrub she was under and just graze your leg with her fingers. The first time she did it I fell over in fright. Just toppled. Standing – not standing. The leopard ghost had struck, again.

FB 6/27/22