Sicily
what the websites didn't suggest

We arrive to Palermo on a Monday, and on Tuesday we sit at Piazza Garibaldi mapping out our plan.  Daniel and I sit on a bench while the kids entertain themselves with freeze tag.  This first game becomes the go-to game for the week, a game I haven't seen our kids play all year.

We finally catch the bus out to see the cathedral at Monreale, a striking church filled with gold mosaics that tell stories of the Bible.

After gelato, the kids set up their freeze tag, pleased by the low bushes where they can hide from the It person.  We invite them on a stroll around the the town, but they have no interest: they are completely engrossed in their game.  Daniel and I check out the town, then return to look at the mosaics in the church.  The kids join us for ten minuteswhere I sit with them and insist they look at the mosaics of Noah and the flood and the huge Jesus over the altar.  Mary and Hannah are loud, so I send them back outside as a consequence -- I'm feeling tough until I realize that they are likely entirely pleased with this consequence.  Their game of freeze tag is the entire afternoon. Daniel and I walk the terrace, the cloisters, the dome.  We check on the kids every fifteen minutes or so.   They hide, pop up, run, hide again.  We realize that we've not had three hours of barely interrupted time in ages.

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On Wednesday, the director tells us all to meet at Piazza Nasce for the bus to take us to Segesta to see the Greek theatre and temple.  We huddle under the awning of a bar as we wait for the bus.

The kids go out into the rain in Piazza Nasce to play freeze tag.

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After the hike up in the rain to the Segesta theatre and a picnic lunch by the temple, Daniel plays freeze tag with the kids, an SYA student hopping in, too.  They play so intently that they miss the first bus back down to the parking lot, but they catch the second.

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When I read blog entries and Slack messages (similar to email) later that night, I see a message in the general channel from a junior, Vanessa.  She asks, "Anyone want to meet outside in Piazza Nasce for freeze tag at 9:30pm?"

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In the hilltop town of Erice, the kids don't care what we see or even eat: they just want a piazza for freeze tag.  While we adults finish up lunch with a Canadian couple we've met -- whose two kids are now playing freeze tag, too -- the kids run and run.  I can hear them from the second floor of the restaurant where we're eating.  The game gets bigger when we adults join, Daniel and Tom "It."

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Friday morning I insist on doing some student blog reading before we head out for the day.  I tell the kids that they can relax in the hotel room if they want, have some down time, thinking that they will be thrilled.

Nope: they head back to Piazza Garibaldi for freeze tag until I'm done reading.

Fountain to run around an hide behind...

He might be bigger and faster, but she's smaller for hiding...

Sneaky sneaky getting below hedges and fountain...

The view Daniel and I have of their game from the terrace of the duomo at Monreale...is this the opposite of helicopter parenting and should we be closer?