The playground was empty when I parked. In truth, it hadn’t been full for thirty years.
The sign is faded. The concrete cracked. The paint peeling.
I grew up at this park. If I close my eyes, I can smell the corndogs cooking in the concession stand. I can taste the tang of Fun Dip on my tongue and feel the cheap plastic of the Ring Pop pinching my skin. It never did fit my ring finger.
I fell asleep on summer Saturday nights to the “ping” of metal bats striking softballs. Crowds clapping or booing from the bleachers. Kids squealing on the monkey bars or the merry-go-round.
The merry-go-round.
We would lay on our backs, my hair dragging in the dirt, and watch the sky as it whirled at what seemed warp speed. We would run in circles, faster and faster, then jump on as the merry-go-round spun. When the warp speed spinning was too much – “I want to get off!” someone would scream – we would dig our heels in the dirt, grip the painted-black metal bar and pull our shoulders practically out of socket to make it stop.
I immersed myself in those memories Saturday as I stood alone at Bayview Park. I took pictures to preserve a piece of my past. I did not consider in the moment that it’s a metaphor for my now.
Restricted routines feel like a slow-motion merry-go-round today. Despite the pace, our minds spin at warp speed.
“I want to get off!” we scream. But we tighten our grip and hold on.
Even before the Coronavirus infected our communities, we braced ourselves against hard things: politics, relationships, or money.
The hard changes. God’s Word does not.
I have carried another piece of my past in my Bible for nearly two years. It’s a Sunday School lesson, or maybe a sermon, written by my daddy. He was studying the Lord’s Prayer.
Daddy writes: (referencing ‘Give us this day our daily bread’)
- v. 11 – This shows our dependency on God.
- This day – shows us that we need to constantly renew our desire toward Him every day.
- We can’t count on what we had yesterday to get us through today.
- It is hard for a body to go a day without the essentials, things to nourish it, and so is the same with our soul and spirit.
I would add to my daddy’s wisdom that we can’t waste our bread today worrying about whether we will have any for tomorrow.
These hard days will soon, though maybe not soon enough, become a piece of our past. A snapshot. A story.
What will we have to show? To say?
I haven’t played at Bayview Park in 30 years. When this season of social distancing ends, maybe I will. Maybe I’ll pull my brothers onto that merry-go-round with me, and we’ll ride at warp speed, and watch the world whirl by.
“This, then, is how you should pray:
Our Father in Heaven,
hallowed be your name,
Your kingdom come,
Your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation
but deliver us from evil.
For yours is the kingdom
and the power
and the glory forever.
Amen.
(Matthew 6: 9-13)
