SoTac: Arlington

Winter’s resistance to Spring’s arrival made me think about this reflection I wrote two years ago.

It was a day in which winter resisted the arrival of spring; gray, chilly and windy. My body was no different. Some laten flu lingered in my bones; tired, chilled and achy. Had there just been one body to account for, undoubtedly I would have stayed in the house. As it was my spring child grabbed my hand and led me outside with his eyes. “Okay,’ I said to my 19 month old son, “we’ll go for a walk but only a short one.” Words are whispers to a toddler, while lacing up shoes act like shouts. Will began to dance like Pavlov’s dog while I laced and wrapped us up.

As so often happens, a step outside turns into a stroll which turns into a walk which eventually takes us somewhere. This day we made our way just a few blocks up the street to Arlington Elementary School. The play area is nestled like a child in the arms of the school building. The northern wing is the body while the east and west arms wrap around the playground like a hug, leaving only the southern side open. This design creates a feeling of trust and comfort that is vital for real play.

It was still afternoon when we arrived, yet for some reason the kids had already vanished. A winter ache spread across my body as the wind whipped across my face. I wondered out loud how long we would stay as I unclipped my son’s strap. His spring body bounded out of the jogger and toward the miniature jungle gym.

For the next while, I simply watched as Will engaged this gym like a crossword puzzle. First one step, then another before he realized a bar prevented his ascension. He then tried another path, another step and another row was filled. When he was stumped and sought my clue, I stepped in with the answer and shimmied my way through a tunnel built for kids 1/7th my age. Laughter echoed in the tunnel behind me as my body plopped out the other end. Trial and error filled out the puzzle with smiles and laughter until Will stopped to notice another game.

Like a river rock, the school splits the wind in two sending it around the eastern and western wings. Most of the wind flows on, but not all. Some of the wind is sucked into the vacuum of the play area. Here the wind swirls and twirls like whirlpools in a river eddy. Is it stuck? Is it resting? Or perhaps the wind is simply imitating the children … playing.

I would not have noticed them if Will had not tried to join their game. Stepping away from the slide, Will waddled toward the corner of the play cove. He wasn’t drawn by the wind. Even a child can’t see wind. Rather he was drawn by the effects of the wind. Just a few feet in front of him was a napkin; used, crumpled, mustard-stained. Yet, one corner of it vibrated and wiggled enough to gain his attention. He moved closer, like a fish inspecting a lure. Then just as he was about to take the bait, the napkin was caught by the wind and thrown into the air. Like a child on a merry-go-round it circled round and round and round till it settled once again only a few feet from where it started. It was then that I noticed the napkin was not the only kid in the game. Just a few feet away a pink ‘Now and Later’ wrapper was revving its engine about to take flight when it too was grabbed by the wind and swung round and round. Then as if the teacher had shouted, “Free Time,” a host of other litter kids jumped into the game, a post-it note chased the napkin which stirred a leaf which landed on a Trident wrapper. Round and round these kids chased one another lifted on the wings of the whirling wind. And we watched, lost in the simple wonder of it all as winter giggled into spring.

David James Duncan, northwest author of The River Why and Brothers K writes, “Wonder is my second favorite condition to be in, after love- and I sometimes wonder whether there’s even a difference: maybe love is just wonder aimed at a beloved. Wonder is like grace, in that it’s not a condition we grasp: wonder grasps us. We do have the freedom to elude wonder’s grasp. We have the freedom to do all sorts of stupid things. By deploying cynicism, rationalism, fear, arrogance, judgementalism, we can evade wonder nonstop all our lives.”

May all of us be drawn out of our winter chills and aches and into a slack jawed wonder of a place making poetry that whirls and swirls and plays in the eddies and edges of the places we live.