The Happily Haunted Playground
October 26, 2013
(Happy Birthday Kath)
Day 174
Team Zybko
The old abandoned playground was definitely more enticing than creepy. It had to be that way for me to even think about going in, cause I don't do creepy very well. Scary movies, haunted houses and zombie talk just aren't my thing. Even to this day, 30 years later the sight of a dark grey and red striped sweater breaks me out into Freddy Krueger hives and I pee in my yoga pants a little. I am a scary girl wimp so I tend to avoid any unnecessary scary in my simple soccer mom life. Back to the pee part, sometimes the best adventures come to you while looking for a bathroom. During the search for indoor plumbing was when the coolest place of the week was discovered. Delaney was already ten minutes into kicking a soccer ball around a freshly cut, beautiful green field as we walked to the cement building in the distance. This was a new complex for us, everything was new, I was relying on my mom spidey senses to locate a clean toilet. The stick figure sign of a girl wearing a skirt got our hopes up but the doors were locked. We try another door and another and another, locked, locked and locked. No worries the woods were calling Drexel's name anyway, so in we go. Happy as a clam he leads us into the canopy of the forest at a safe distance. He may even have been whistling when I can see he has come to an abrupt stop. My first thought is snake, my second thought is....Oh snap did I remember to tuck my iPhone into my sports bra?...my third thought was...do they still suggest sucking the poison out or didn't they change that like the CPR thing....ugh I should have paid more attention to that show on the Discovery....my fourth thought was...can you believe that entire documentary on mermaids was made up?
MOM! MOM! YOU HAVE GOT TO SEE THIS!
Drexel's shouts snapped me out of my agitation towards the directors of that show. Mermaids, yes I believed it all, I mean they had legit flip phone recorded footage and everything. Ugh.
COME HERE MOM!
La La held my hand tighter as the brush became thicker the farther we walked to catch up. I was happy to see it wasn't a venomous creature of any kind but my eyes did open unnaturally wide as I peered above a chain linked fence overgrown with wild weeds.
WOW! I saw for my own eyes his amazement.
The pictures I took from the outside the perimeter just weren't cutting it, I knew I would need to get closer to capture the coolness. We were gonna have to "break in". As we entered the vine infested playground everywhere our cautious eyes landed screamed of a place dead, gone and forgotten. We continued anyway, pulled in, too curious to turn back and retreat to the bright light of the setting sun. The world inside was different from where we just came, 20 feet behind us was sunlight and a clear view of the blue sky. I can't believe it didn't freak La La out as we dodged spider webs, 3 inch thorns and the hanging vines hitting the back of our neck that felt like creepy insects of some sort. The green leaves wrapped beautifully around the bars were like art work. The place was too interesting to abort, I suppose she received the nosey gene honestly, Baby Daddy of course. Ha.
It's like we are standing on history, Drexel exclaims, super excited about the next 30 minutes of exploring that laid ahead.
I know Drex.
Mom, I'm serious.
He thought I was mocking him but I wasn't at all. In fact my imagination was already full speed ahead, envisioning sunny afternoons spent here by other mommas and their little ones. I inadvertently scanned the ground for traces of picnics, snacks and good times. There has got to be a decaying capri sun pouch or a granola bar wrapper here somewhere. The kids invented a game to play on the half-way broken slide, covered in leaves and dirt. Pretty sure it was jungle themed like Jumangi or something. Their giggles fading to the back of my mind as I happily poked around, letting my purple Nikes lead the way. The ones that match my one Clemson shirt perfectly. Should I risk tearing them up in the now knee high bed of thorns? Oh most certainly. To me this was like a rare ancient archaeological find. I treaded softly not wanting to disturb anything. I could care less about dinosaur bones or searching for 4,752 small bits of pottery to puzzle piece together to recreate a vase. But people and their stories, this is what gets me going. Babies learning to walk, spontaneous games of tags, callous proudly earned from the monkey bars, illegally going up the wrong way on the slide to avoid cooties from the opposite sex, near toddler misses from fast paced swings and conversations from one parent to the other about simple things happening in life.
A playground junkie I guess that's what I am. One day my stuffed full book of memories made in, on and around metal kid equipment will be just that, memories. Not unlike the mommas who stood here before me, we keep going and making more despite that the fact some will be forgotten. We can only hope that intertwined in the long days of childhood we help create lasting ones. Happy, helpful lessons that our kids will take with them into adult hood. The memories that withstand any harsh weather, poison ivy and of course mermaid attacks.
MOM! MOM! YOU HAVE GOT TO SEE THIS!
Drexel's shouts snapped me out of my agitation towards the directors of that show. Mermaids, yes I believed it all, I mean they had legit flip phone recorded footage and everything. Ugh.
COME HERE MOM!
La La held my hand tighter as the brush became thicker the farther we walked to catch up. I was happy to see it wasn't a venomous creature of any kind but my eyes did open unnaturally wide as I peered above a chain linked fence overgrown with wild weeds.
WOW! I saw for my own eyes his amazement.
The pictures I took from the outside the perimeter just weren't cutting it, I knew I would need to get closer to capture the coolness. We were gonna have to "break in". As we entered the vine infested playground everywhere our cautious eyes landed screamed of a place dead, gone and forgotten. We continued anyway, pulled in, too curious to turn back and retreat to the bright light of the setting sun. The world inside was different from where we just came, 20 feet behind us was sunlight and a clear view of the blue sky. I can't believe it didn't freak La La out as we dodged spider webs, 3 inch thorns and the hanging vines hitting the back of our neck that felt like creepy insects of some sort. The green leaves wrapped beautifully around the bars were like art work. The place was too interesting to abort, I suppose she received the nosey gene honestly, Baby Daddy of course. Ha.
It's like we are standing on history, Drexel exclaims, super excited about the next 30 minutes of exploring that laid ahead.
I know Drex.
Mom, I'm serious.
He thought I was mocking him but I wasn't at all. In fact my imagination was already full speed ahead, envisioning sunny afternoons spent here by other mommas and their little ones. I inadvertently scanned the ground for traces of picnics, snacks and good times. There has got to be a decaying capri sun pouch or a granola bar wrapper here somewhere. The kids invented a game to play on the half-way broken slide, covered in leaves and dirt. Pretty sure it was jungle themed like Jumangi or something. Their giggles fading to the back of my mind as I happily poked around, letting my purple Nikes lead the way. The ones that match my one Clemson shirt perfectly. Should I risk tearing them up in the now knee high bed of thorns? Oh most certainly. To me this was like a rare ancient archaeological find. I treaded softly not wanting to disturb anything. I could care less about dinosaur bones or searching for 4,752 small bits of pottery to puzzle piece together to recreate a vase. But people and their stories, this is what gets me going. Babies learning to walk, spontaneous games of tags, callous proudly earned from the monkey bars, illegally going up the wrong way on the slide to avoid cooties from the opposite sex, near toddler misses from fast paced swings and conversations from one parent to the other about simple things happening in life.
A playground junkie I guess that's what I am. One day my stuffed full book of memories made in, on and around metal kid equipment will be just that, memories. Not unlike the mommas who stood here before me, we keep going and making more despite that the fact some will be forgotten. We can only hope that intertwined in the long days of childhood we help create lasting ones. Happy, helpful lessons that our kids will take with them into adult hood. The memories that withstand any harsh weather, poison ivy and of course mermaid attacks.
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