but now I can't remember it. Oh yeahhh "making memories". As this past weekend was the Memorial Day holiday, it seems appropriate. Memorial Day is like summer kick off day- and we did it up right this year. Took the kids to the pool, had a BBQ at the sister's, stayed up way too late watching scary movies and eating candy. (Ok, so that last one actually happens all year round but anyway...)
I took the boys and their friend to the pool Sunday. It really brought back a ton of memories. When the sister and I were kids we would spend summers with our grandparents. And a couple of those summers were spent living "in town" so we road our bikes to the pool almost daily it seemed. We started swimming when we were 2, in that same town pool; went off the high dive for the first time at our 5th birthday, at that same town pool (wearing the little plastic inflatible ring with the duck's head, just in case). I can still taste the taffy from the snack stand, eating it during a pool break, sitting on the grassy hill outside the fence. And there was a little play area there, too. It had this... thing. I don't even know what to call it! Like a giant round swing. I've never seen one anywhere else. It was made of wood, with a bench runnng all the way around to sit on, your feet dangling down in the middle, and some kind of bar going around to hold onto. It must have been connected to a pole or something and it would swing back and forth if someone pushed off. But not just straight back and forth, it depended where each kid was sitting and who was pushing off. And I never thought of this... ride?... swing?... thing, until I started chasing the memories of summers passed.
The pools these days are a bit more upscale- not just "play areas" and "diving areas" but waterslides and whirl pools; lazy rivers. But they still feel the same- hot concrete under your feet, the water so cool on your skin when you first slide in, the sun beating down on your shoulders. I want my kids to have those memories, too.
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