On the M5 Bus

On the M5 bus, rolling along Riverside Drive, we are passing playgrounds my kids used to roam in years and years and years past.

When you're thick in the middle of it, you really don't think: "This phase is going to zip by and be gone in a blink, so I better stop and treasure every moment." even though EVERYONE with older kids tells you to.

Each day drags on so, you think: "I'm going to be spending the rest of my motherloving life in this godforsaken playground with sand down my shirt, fighting the squirrels for possession of my kids' snacks!"

But no. You spin around three times and squint at the sun, and those days are long gone; barely a wisp of a memory to look back on fondly... Playgrounds full of shade and welcoming benches you could park yourself on - at least for a little while, when the activity localized on this particular climbing bar, that particular tire swing.

Though these were also the days of "Push me Mommy, push me! Push me higher, and higher, and higher, and higher." And "Noooooo, it's more fun when you do it!" And aching arms. But worth it for the happily worn out, easier to bed down children.

Now playgrounds are "boring & for babies" and the good basketball hoops in this city are few and far between and often taken over by teens and beyond; grown-ups taking their sport very seriously and yelling at the kids whose errant bouncing balls interfere with their a-little-more-intense-than-friendly games.

A little old to be dominating a schoolyard, no?

I want to yell at them: "You're in a SCHOOLYARD, dude. First off - lighten up! Second off - don't you think you should give the kids whose school this is the chance to play in their Own. Damn. Yard?!?!?!

But I don't want my nose broken so I keep my mouth shut. Also it would embarrass my son who wants nothing more than to play, but is totally intimidated by these big, sweaty men.

So we bide our time, wait for a half court to open up.

Because my boys, they love their basketball.  And playgrounds are for babies.

Ethan & Jacob, July 2004

I miss those babies, I do.

I am linking this up with Just Write, because this was definitely free-written; just a little slice of life and thought.