My oldest daughter is a jailbird. She just spent much of the last two hours �in jail.� At the synagogue�s Purim carnival, you could put someone in jail for a few tickets. For a few tickets, you could be bailed out. Her time in jail might have had something to do with B-O-Y running the jail. He did not �arrest� her. It wouldn�t have been his style. Besides, his friends were willing to do it for him.

It reminded me of when I was in first grade. On the playground we had a climber with a domed top. I know that climber wasn�t huge but it is in my memory�but then I was a tiny thing at the time. The girls would run around the playground and the boys, including Dr. Road, would chase them. Once caught, the girl would go off to be put inside the climber and guarded loosely by the boys, often escaping quite quickly. Most of the girls didn�t mind. Most of them were flattered. Those who weren�t chased were concerned although it mattered very much which boy caught them.

The late sixties and the seventies came between the climber and Kat�s jailing. Liberation of women came between the climber and Kat�s jailing. Things changed between the climber and the jailing, yet nothing changed. My father is fond of quoting one of his teachers who told him that while times changed people did not. The older I get, the more I think his teacher was on to something.

I like to think that my daughters have a lot of options and they do. I am not naive enough to believe that anyone can have it all. Life is full of choices that require us to set priorities. I don�t want my daughters to believe that they have to be chased by guys or that they have to chase them. And yet, I recognize that the games men and women play change form but not content. Chasing and being chased happens subtly or, among first graders, not-so-subtly and no intellectual liberation will free us from our hormonal and emotional sides.

All I can hope, then, is that my girls know when to allow themselves to be caught and when not to. Kat seems to have reasonably good sense. She made sure I had �bail� tickets and that I got her out and kept her out long enough for her to have lunch. She also made herself scarce for a while when she wanted not to be caught. For now, she can handle herself.

I did note, however, that she did not jail B-O-Y. Whether that occurred through principle or happenstance, I do not know. She was hoarding prize tickets to get a stuffed animal for a sick Day-Hay so perhaps she just had difference priorities. Perhaps she just didn�t want to play the game that way. She did take great pleasure out of jailing a female friend.

Catching and being caught. Males and females. I�ve never quite figured it out. Now my girls are beginning to work on the problem and it�s fascinating to watch.

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