Dead.

Children really do not have a concept of death. I observe them playing all the time: someone "dies" and moments later miracle of miracles the dead person rises to their normal playtime capacity. It is probably for the best and all. Death is a pretty gray subject. I mean as gray as it gets knowing that the person gets to rest from the trials of this temporal existence. However, today I decided to test a theory. I was curious to see what my kids (the ones I nanny) would do if I played real dead instead of the fake kind. After they killed me in a rousing game of Evil Witch, I became a helpless, dead weight, eyes-closed observer. Looking back on the experience I tried to imagine the series of events playing out from their points of view. In their innocent minds it must have gone something like this:
*imagine all this playing out with the mad giggles that only a 5 year old girl can produce.

The evil old witch has locked us up for the last time. We will use her poison candy to kill her! Eat this!

Ha ha! It has worked perfectly and she is dead. Now we will just continue the process 5 more times after she wakes back up.
...

She is still not moving. My hyperactivity cannot handle this much anticipation. Must hurry the waking-up process.

Lift her head up! Pull her arms out! She is a Bouncy! Jump on her! Oh golly, that has only moved her to the floor instead of the chair. She still hasn't woken up yet. Does she even know how to play dead?

Yell louder! Pull harder! Oh, lets poke her. Still nothing...punch her!

Witch wake up! Wake up or I will spank your bottom! I am going to do it. Slap! No reaction. Slap more! Still nothing.

Witch, we don't want to play with you anymore. We are going inside. We are going to do it. You better wake up and stop us.

Wake up! Stretch it farther that will work. Nothing.

--- and then they pulled out the big guns and I could no longer play along ---

Bella! Come lick the witch!

--- Bella, one of the family dogs, is one of the dirtiest creatures. She lives in a paradise and manages to get into everything. No more than 20 minutes prior to playing Evil Witch I saw the wretched beast gnawing on something that was beyond succeeding at playing dead. The smell wafted along the canyon breezes and made my nose hair curl. ---

That threat did the trick and I was up. Even though I was a little battle torn from the 5 minute experience, it still makes me chuckle. Oh the logic of children.