Here is the second memoir that I wrote. We had to do an imitation of an author’s style (Mary McCarthy, if you’ve heard of her), so that explains my long sentences, occasional short sentences for emphasis, use of semicolons, parentheses, and dashes, use of lists, and the way I mention my characters’ names (“Michael” instead of “my brother,” etc.).
(By the way, I got As on both papers and an A in the class. Yay for memoirs!)
I can mark the exact day my childhood ended. As on any other Sunday, my Sony Kids’ alarm clock woke me up to my favorite Beatles tunes; I ate my bowl of sugary cereal (Cocoa Puffs, Count Chocula, and Cinnamon Toast Crunch were my favorites)—I haven’t gone a day in my life without breakfast; I prepared myself mentally for a day of homework—English papers to write, chemistry quizzes to study for, and math problems to do—as well as general errands, like orthodontist appointments and buying the new pillow I needed. I said a cheery “good morning” to my parents and my brother Michael, and asked them what their plans for the day were. “We’re giving the swingset-clubhouse away to the neighbors today,” my dad told me.
I hadn’t played on the swingset in the backyard for years—I was too old for it, I had better things to do, I outgrew it—but when I came home later that night to find a more spacious, sophisticated, swing-less backyard, something inside me died. Just as I couldn’t imagine giving up Blue Bear—my oldest friend, who happened to be soft and fuzzy and have plastic eyes—it was hard for me to say goodbye to the Lehrer family’s own mini-playground that had been such an integral part of the fun I had as a child.
My dad had used a light brown piece of 4-by-6 lumber to connect the various components of this massive contraption: a silver parallel bar that glistened on sunny days, suspended by chains covered in shiny blue plastic, great for backflips and pull-ups; a hanging wooden seesaw, where two would sit and rock back and forth (that is, until it was used so frequently that when David—one of Michael’s larger friends—sat on it, it cracked); and two blue swings hung by the same blue chains. The grass underneath the two swings had eroded under the constant dragging of swinging feet. Connected to the side of the swings was a ladder with wooden rungs and a black rope with knots, both leading nowhere in particular—it wasn’t about getting somewhere, though, it was the good feeling we got as we made it to the top. What I remember as most impressive, though, was the clubhouse section—a wooden, two-leveled open platform with a ladder going up and a yellow slide going down, and a blue plastic sheet roof that looked like a tent: the top floor held a small picnic table, big enough for four young children; the bottom floor had only grass.
Michael and I would spend hours playing out here. We would swing back and forth on the swings, pumping our feet to get higher and higher; we would slide down the slippery slide; and we would run around the swingset to see who was faster and who could avoid tagging the other—but our favorite activity was the game we invented: “Swingkick.” It was like kickball, except that the kicker was not standing, but in mid-swing, and would kick the ball that the pitcher threw from a few feet away; the goal was to kick the ball as far as possible, without hitting the powerlines above us, and without kicking the ball into Denise’s yard next door—if that happened, we’d have to climb over the fence to retrieve the ball, which was not a desirable part of the game. Once, when I kicked the ball into the tall tree in front of me, it got lodged in between two branches, but Michael knew exactly how to recover the ball: I would get one of my old gym shoes—for some reason, I couldn’t bear to part with my old pairs of shoes—which he’d fire at the ball in the tree, thus sending the ball and the shoe tumbling down the branches. His method worked in getting the ball down, but the shoe was caught by the laces on a branch, where it stayed through the rest of the spring, summer, and fall.
On hot days, we’d set up the hose to spray the slide—our own makeshift water park: we even placed the inflatable blue and yellow kiddie pool at the bottom of the slide for an extra wet landing and a big splash; in the winter, we packed extra snow on the slide for an exhilarating ride that was more convenient and more fun than sledding or tobogganing at the park or at “Mount Trashmore,” the tallest hill in Evanston (we live in the Prairie State, so hills aren’t exactly common); when the weather was chilly, my mom would pack a picnic basket full of snacks for me to share in the clubhouse with Stephanie, my across-the-street neighbor, my favorite summer and afterschool playmate; we felt like we were on an adventure.
And that’s what this playground was for me—a hideout, a getaway from the real world of spelling tests (those were my first pieces of homework, in first grade, and they made me feel like a “big girl” in school) and practicing piano (I loved to play, but I hated to practice. I was supposed to practice five days each week, but I usually just practiced in the 20 minutes before my teacher arrived at my house for our weekly lesson). Soaring high into the air on a swing, I felt free, like I could fly; looking out from the tall clubhouse, I saw the world from a new angle, seeing the tops of the evergreen trees and the neighborhood houses and buildings—was that Tara’s chimney over there, or did it belong to the Jims? On the swingset, I felt no competition: Michael, Stephanie, the other neighborhood kids and I were all just having a good time together.
When I think of my home, I still picture the swingset-clubhouse in the backyard; I haven’t forgotten the small, simple swing in our front yard that my dad built from a piece of plywood and a rope; I still see the basketball hoop in our driveway: but after the swingset was dragged out of my life and into someone else’s, the front swing broke, and the basketball hoop was moved to make way for the new driveway (we couldn’t drive over it for two weeks) and landscaping (as soon as I left for college and my parents were “empty-nesters,” they took it upon themselves to redo our entire front lawn—the addition of oddly shaped bushes, unusual plants, and the deletion of our old, dying bushes makes it look like a different house). Each time I return home from college, something else that was an important, permanent part of my youth—something I thought I could count on forever—has gone.
Sometimes I wish I could just call Michael up and challenge him to a game of Swingkick, or invite him to a picnic in the clubhouse. But we don’t need the swingset anymore to be close; we can meet for lunch at Norris or take a walk down Sheridan Road instead. I talk on the phone, IM, or e-mail my parents daily—just like the swingset was, they have been nailed into my life by a strong hammer. I know that the next time I come home, what really matters in my life will still be there.
