My Daughter Cheats At Tag

I watched Natalie run around the park with some other kids. She's not shy. If she spots a child she'll walk over and go, "Hi. Want to play?" She's rarely alone for long when I take her out.


She was playing tag the last time I took her out. The little kid who was It almost made it to her but before Natalie could be touched she shouted, "Base! I'm on base now!"

Um.

The problem with that was she just randomly announced it.

Oh well, just kids being silly. Maybe they had established that area as base and I didn't hear. I went back to my book and heard Natalie call again, "I'm on base!" I looked up and saw Natalie in ANOTHER area of the park.

"That's cheating!" I shouted.

Some other parents who were sitting stared over at me.

Ahem. I calmly shut my book and stood up. I walked over to Natalie, who was gaping at me.

"That," I told her. "Is called cheating. You can't just make up rules." I had to set her straight. If she kept it up, no one would ever want to play with her. They'd dub her Base Girl and snicker, "EVERY place she stands is base. Ha ha ha."

Natalie lifted her chin up. "It's not cheating. All these places are base." She said this to me slowly as if I were an inebriated idiot.

"So if you're It, you won't mind if your friends announce that they are on base the second you try to touch them?" I inquired.

Natalie blinked. This seemed to somewhat compute.

"Now run. There is no base," I told Natalie and winked at the little girl who was It. I think I scared her. She rushed away to the slide.

Natalie huffed. "Fine."

I thought she was going to play correctly. But then she shouted, "I'm not playing tag. I'm swinging." So the kids followed her over to the swings.

Oh well. I tried. Hopefully the next time she plays tag she doesn't think that every single area she's at is base and become Base Girl.