Life Is A Playground And Here’s Why

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The playground is a child’s temple. It is a place to run without being yelled at, to get scrapes and not care, and to imagine limitlessly. Jungle gyms are ships sailing to faraway islands as sharks swim beneath on an ocean of wood chips…Kids learn to kick their legs in unison on the swings and hang on the monkey bars (maybe even upside down). Kids on a playground are just like people living their lives, and here’s why:

1. The Swings.

They are life’s most exhilarating moments. The swings are the nights you’ll remember forever or at least always have blurred memories of. They are the vacations, the roller coasters, the first kisses, sex, and bungee jumping. While you’re on the swings, you’re high and you’re low every second. Your stomach drops and your legs dangle free in the air. All you have to do is kick your legs (an art typically mastered in one’s youth). The summer breeze is suddenly so much cooler and fresher as your hair flips back and forth in your face and away from it. You can swing until you’re too tired to swing any longer, but once you gain height it’s easy to stay afloat. When you’re finally finished with the high you simply quit kicking and let your momentum do the work.

2. Monkey Bars.

Yes, those little baby muscles really can hang on! As a kid, gripping one’s baby fingers around the sun-heated metal monkey bars is a daunting task. At first, all you can really do is hang on to one bar and try not to let your sweaty palms slip away. The monkey bars are life’s challenges: you must always remember that if you hang on to the bars long enough and progress from one to the next, you’ll eventually make it to the other side.

3. The Slide.

The slide is a liberating experience, an essential playground item. It’s a quick, sloped fall from higher ground. However, before you can enjoy the ride down, you first have to climb your way up. Like many of life’s experiences, we have to do a lot of work before enjoying the actual event. Climbing up to a slide can be like planning a big event and the ride down might be the event itself. It’s studying hard to earn an A in bio-chem. It’s the walk uphill that leads to something good. The slide tells little tots that, yes, hard work pays off.

4. The Tire Swing.

It’s the end of the day, the sun is going down and cicadas have begun to hum their twilight tune. Now the playground is quiet, peaceful as it may ever be and the tire swing looks as desirable as ever. The tire swing is relaxation time. Your wine nights, lazy Sundays and meditation sessions. The tire swing is the time to plop your bottom down and chill, stare up at the sky and watch the clouds pass by.