The swing

There were many times in my childhood that certain blocks of time would be blank in my memory. I found that rather unnerving, but now that I am older and can talk to my siblings about those moments, the blanks are steadily being filled with reminders.

However, what I have never forgotten were the times I would spend playing on an old swing in the yard of a very old house my family used to live in before I was born. The swing was made out of a ship rope that my dad had aquired when my older siblings were kids. He tied the rope between two trees in the yard, and it was really quite nice.

The "Old-house" as I used to call it was falling in on itself, nature taking back what once belonged to it. The house was made out of oak, so it still stands today, though it is not long for this world. While during thw greener parts of the year, the branches of the trees would be so heavy with life that they would create a curtain between me on the swing and the rest of the world. It was a perfect escape for me. (In all honesty, I always thought myself stuck out there. I had friends, but I didn't get to see them all that much. So, I would use that place as a way to leave the boundary of my home.)

That swing came to represent much for my younger self. I would play pretend in worlds of my own creation. I would think of ways to implant myself into the stories of different shows or books I liked. This went on for years. That swing was a gateway to everywhere else. After a while, I could take that same experience with me anywhere I was, which became a distraction at times, but nothing ever was as good as that swing.

In the 8th grade, I developed a childish paranoia that I was constantly being watched, so, ashamed of the idea of being caught playing pretend as a 14 year old, I stopped going to the swing.

One of the trees the swing was attached to was dying, and finally David and Eric took it down. That was a year ago. However, I had developed a story, a world of my own, in that place. It is the same story I've been working on since I was 12. It has been nearly ten years since then, and the story has gone through more changes that I had ever thought it would. It is the story I am currently trying to write down.

Someday, I hope to finish that story, so that other kids in situations like I was in growing up can have a world that they can explore and play in. I want to give to others the spark of imagination, so that maybe life wont be so hard.