Parks and Recreation...

Why do we ever stop going to the park? I suppose because we outgrow the playground equipment, and of course, grown men can't exactly hang out in parks without a family on their hip or they're just creepy. It's unfortunate. I can always have a good time at the park. Of course, the swings make me want to puke, and the slides don't make me squeal anymore, but the whole place is just ripe for nonsense. They're even better if you can bring your daughter to them in order to butter her up into easing up on the hard time that she's been giving you all day.



I'd like to think that there will never be a time when I can't act a fool but I know it's coming. One of these days I'm going to wake up with just no interest in shenanigans. That's going to be a sad day.



Oddly enough, the park is already giving me hints that I should find my fun somewhere else. Typically the swings make me feel ill, the slide can help my stomach creep up into my throat, and flipping, hanging, swinging or any other super kinetic endeavor can leave me feeling like it was my first day on a swaying cruise ship. Apparently whatever little biological troll is in charge of my balance and is responsible for cueing nausea is finding his legs the older I get.



Zo's still a little too young for solo park time. I've never noticed how absolutely frighteningly unsafe your average community park is until I help Zoey navigate one. I suppose they aren't made for 20 month olds ('cause that's what Zoey is today) but still...you can sit back and pick the places where a kid could find some trouble. I can at least. Of course, we're also discovering that parks aren't all that Mommy-friendly if you're just a 5'3" Mom. Dad gets the high up stuff, and June typically does her best work on the ground.



Of course, no matter how much fun you're having in the park, it's always nice to come home, especially when the cheap ploy of plying a little girl with slides and swings and giant wooden play structures, butters her up enough to finally spend some time with her. I don't know what her deal was all day, but it felt good to grab a few smiles in the park and then slip home and onto the living room floor to enjoy some of our usual scribbling. It's one of my most favorite things, and hers too, I think. All I really know is that it felt like I found my daughter after a day of living with an indifferent little stranger.



Someday she's not going to want to sit on the living room floor and draw and color and sharpen pencil crayons until they're tiny little nubs, so I'm stocking up on these memories. Drawing with Dad is cool now, but wait eleven or twelve years and then it will just be lame, or whatever descriptive is the shizzle then.