ANEW: Last Night, Night Before…
Neighborhood buddies and the currency of childhood games.
“Last night, night before, twenty-four robbers at my door. I got up and let them in, hit 'em in the head with a rolling pin—all hid?!”
That was the battle cry, the launchpad of our revels, the unofficial anthem of the start of summer for every kid in the Old Projects in Robbins, Illinois. The Richard Flowers Homes. We sang it throughout those years, loud, proud, and with the finder and searcher being the lead singer, like we were part of some ancient ritual passed down from the gods of childhood memory. And in a way, we were. Summer was sacred. Summer was a season and a mindset. And that chant was the drumbeat of our days. The games would come and go, but hide and seeks launched us. Together!
Back then, our games weren’t structured by rules written down anywhere. They were handed down orally, through the grapevine of the playground, or invented on the fly. No app, no schedule, no coaches. Just time, sweat, concrete, and imagination.
We lived for the kinds of games that kept us out of our parents’ hair and away from the TV. Games that made us run, scream, think, and test one another. Games with the sweet taste of summer on their breath—like watermelon so cold it made your brian hurt, or grapes stolen one by one from the fridge when nobody was looking. Sometimes, if you were lucky, even a rare and mysterious pomegranate. (We didn’t know what it was, but it felt fancy and something from storybooks about golden apples and such.)
We were four: me, my brother Michael, Alvin, and Topper. That was the crew.
Topper lived behind us with his grandmother. I have no idea what Topper’s real name was—none. Maybe someone reading this can remind me. I think he was my brother’s age—four years older than me—but age didn’t matter much to your immediate friend group. We were connected to each other through the games we craved, played, and created. Plus, your friend group for the summer was nearby, even if you never really saw them much at all during the school year. Your neighborhood buddies became your identity, your currency.
Alvin was somewhere between all of us, age-wise. He had this wild smile and a way of teasing you that somehow always made you feel like part of something. What we did most was torment each other, as boys do. But when we weren't teasing, we were experimenting. With hobbies, with dreams, with physics (though we didn’t call it that).
We built model airplanes, model cars, model anything. Things that moved, things that could fly. This was in the pre-drone era, people. If you wanted something that flew, you built it. From a kit. From the back of some comic book or other. With your own two hands. You didn’t buy joy, you earned it—with patience, glue, lawn-cutting or paper route money, and a whole lot of imagination. The best currency in the world.
Our parents clipped S&H Green Stamps. Or Plaid Stamps. We three boys clipped memories.
Some were sweet, some painful—like the time my brother and I played Superman. I don’t think Topper was there, but Alvin was. We’d been watching that old George Reeves Superman series, the one from the ’50s. We were obsessed. So, naturally, my brother had the idea that I should stretch out my arms, leap, and fly. Just like the Man of Steel.
Well, I flew all right—straight into a folding chair.
Knocked my front tooth dead. It turned black, and it stayed that way for a year. Eventually, the baby tooth fell out and was replaced. My mother was not amused. My brother caught hell. But it became another story in our collection, another badge from the summer games.
We played baseball too—but not Little League. Not the organized kind. We made our own leagues, our own rules. Chalked strike zones on brick walls, from neck to knees, with a giant X right in the middle. Strike Out was the name of the game. If the ball hit the box and you swung? Strike. Missed? Ball. We argued about every pitch. That was part of the fun.
The best games came after dinner, when the sun dropped and the heat finally let go of your lungs. We called them night games. Hide-and-seek. Freeze tag. Red Light, Green Light. Ghost in the Graveyard. Everyone played—girls, boys, little kids, big kids. Sometimes, the entire block moved like one breathing, laughing, running creature. Like we were all plugged into the same source of energy and joy.
One summer, we got so inspired by the Vietnam War (because it was always on TV) that we started digging foxholes in the backyard. We had no real idea what we were doing, but it felt like we were preparing for something important. Until a father we barely knew came by and made us fill the whole thing in. Said we could kill ourselves if it caved in. Lesson learned.
Sometimes we crossed the forbidden line—literally. 137th Street. That was the line we weren’t supposed to cross. On the other side was an abandoned church, and one summer, we just had to explore it. A guy with a gun made us get out. I think it was the minister, which has made me a little suspect of organized religion ever since. Man of God holding a gun. Picture that! That’s how summer works: rules are guidelines, unexpected encounters, and abandoned buildings are treasure maps leading to further adventures.
There was no pool. No summer camp. No iPads. Just heat, concrete, shade trees, and a crew of kids ranging through the neighborhood like it was Narnia. We made ourselves available to each other in a way kids rarely do anymore. It was love. It was community. It was childhood—uninterrupted and unsupervised.
And then it ended.
We moved away, as families do, and the magic scattered. But in my mind, Robbins is mythic. Bigger than it probably was. Better than it had any right to be. Those projects weren’t just buildings. They were arenas. Playgrounds. Stages for joy and harsh realities sometimes, too.
Because here’s the truth:
Kids’ games aren’t just games to kids. They are practice for life. They are rehearsals for everything we’ll ever need—how to lose, how to wait your turn, how to climb, swing, run, imagine, and belong.
Even today, I can hear the chant:
“Last night, night before…”
And I remember the heatwaves, the teasing, the daring, the love. I remember us.
May it always be so.
Curated Listening:
The soundtrack of the Richard Flowers Projects in Robbins was Motown. THE most iconic group that represents the Motown sound is the Supremes. Listen to Diana Ross and the Supremes sing “Baby Love” HERE.
Lovely column Brian. I too was part of a neighborhood group of kids that played games outdoors every spring and summer night after dinner…(my city raised kid was fascinated by those stories)
Childhood summer memories are thick with resonance. Love reading about yours. Beautiful, vivid.