Swing Set  by Anne Kaier                                                                        Bookmark and Share

 

            
            Driving past my elementary school in the February dusk, I see the steel girders of the new academic building jut over our old playground and wonder if concrete blocks have already crushed the hollow where the swing set stood. In October 1954, Tucky Murray, nine and curly headed, sometimes met me there. He wanted to be an astronaut. Whenever he showed up at the swings, I felt glad of his company. Too often I tangled the chains by myself, kicking the dirt with my scuffed shoes.


            Tonight construction lights blare through the support beams. I slow down. My students at Rosemont College across the street can wait a little for the start of class. I want to see what’s happening to the school yard, to the actual ground where I played as a child. I’m deep into middle age. Why does this new behemoth of steel have to rise above my hollow like some unfinished parking lot? 


            Fifty years ago, the school nestled in a refurbished Tudor mansion. Upstairs, our fourth grade classroom crouched under the eves. One warm morning, I straightened my glasses with my wrist and bent my head over my composition about Abe Lincoln. I was the best story-teller in the class. Down the row, Tucky slipped his Tom Corbett Space Cadet comic into the wooden cavern of his desk. I wondered if he’d show it to me at recess, so I didn’t have to swirl around with all the others on the blacktop like one dot in a rushing galaxy. I was scared of recess. It made my arms feel loose and I knew I wouldn’t get picked for any teams.


            
            Tonight, my windshield wipers clear snow as I pull into the school’s driveway. Huge support beams hold up the superstructure. A crane is jack knifed over the highest floor.


            When the recess bell rang, I pushed slowly through the fire door and then clumped and skidded down the rubber grid on the windowless back stairs, the sluggards pushing behind me, the leaders laughing as they opened the playground door. Outside, I slipped past the hopscotch twosomes on the blistering blacktop, and ran down the steep bulb of the hill towards the swing set, pretending I had someone to meet there. I swung for a while, pumping my long legs straight out against the air, then pulling my ankles against my thighs. Sunlight dappled the horse chestnut tree.


            I get out of the car and walk over to the temporary construction fence. The work lights sting my eyes. The tree has survived, its roots surrounded by a new stone retaining wall, but the grey concrete foundation has stolen the ground where the swing set stood.  


            After a few minutes soaring into the tree tops, I saw Tucky wrestling with some other boy, but when the skirmish ended, Tuck shoved the kid aside and started down the hill. He zigzagged toward me, his white shirt hanging out of his pants.


            “Hi, Anne.”


            “Hi, Tucky.” I slowed my swing down while he crouched on the ground, digging in the dirt with a stick. His drawing looked like some kind of rocket. Then he grinned up at me. “I’ll be in the stratosphere.”


            “Wow. So you’ll be up in the stars?”


            “Yeah. Like a space cadet on TV. Captain Video. You know, Channel 6 after dinner.”


            “We don’t have a TV. Dad says they’re too noisy.”


            “That’s kinda strange.” He got up and crunched some horse chestnuts under his brown Oxford shoes. “Well, I’m going into space. Maybe you can write a story about it.”


            “Sure.” I twirled on the swing. “I’m gonna be a ballerina.”


            He swung around and punched the air. “On top of a rocket. Kaboom! Zoom!”


            My toes touched the ground. “Wanna swing?”


            “Sure, might as well.” He got on the other seat and pretty soon we pumped up so high we rattled the whole swing set but my hands curled around the cool links and my arms felt strong.

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