Wednesday, August 28, 2013

A Walk in the Park: Playgrounds


 The city in the country.

There's something creepy to me about empty playgrounds. Most of the scariest bully attacks happened to me on playgrounds as a kid. Me and my cousins were surrounded and hassled by a big group of tormentors, on a family visit to their hometown, when our parents urged us out the door to "go out and play". Some fun. I whispered to my cousins to make a run for it at my sign when the older kids were distracted by some other young kids coming to play in "their yard", and they did. Nothing like running for your life, being chased by several very large punk ass kids, jeering and making threats at your heels, to give wings to your feet. Never have I run so fast for so long without getting winded. It remains my example to that very basic question: fight, or flight?

Getaway ride? I think not.

Me? I'm a fighter. I stand my ground. But my younger cousins from upstate would never had made it out alive using their fists with these toughs from the city,  who came with the flight families made to what they thought harbored safer grounds in the suburbs. See that empty horsey ride? Yeah, I don't like the looks of it either. What do some things remind you about childhood? Night lights, for a fear of the dark? Open closets, to foil those horrible nightmarish monsters? Tell me. Mommy understands.

Fly away home.