From the Swing

I liked the swing: we always had the swing, even when I was a girl and couldn’t reach the seat because my limbs weren’t long enough to pull myself into the seat. 

I liked the world from the swing best: the trees did little dancing movements that they didn’t dare when I was standing on two, solid feet. 

The wind didn’t brush and smooth my cheeks: the grass wasn’t so stiff and dark.

It blurred, like a stretch of fabric, like my mother’s bedsheets. 

I couldn’t take the swing with me to school, or when I went walking down the road, or inside, to hang in my bedroom, as I slept. 

But I could close my eyes and picture the world tilting, just a little. Just a soft movement: and in that way, I could take the swing with me. 

•••

The summer I broke my ankle was the first summer I couldn’t swing. 

I was tall enough, then, but my cast wouldn’t allow the soft jerking that such motions made: and I had to sit outside, hot and deflated on the steps and watch the wind move the swing in my stead. 

The wooden seat was wide and gleaming. 

Little birds would stop and plop onto its flatness and do a short, sweet dancing that made me envious, before moving on again in their flight.

Mom brought me lemonade. I drank it with the world perfectly sharp and still around me. 

It wasn’t the same as if I’d drunk it from the swing. 

•••

The first four weeks were easy: I could run my fingers on the wood, touch the rope chains, sway a little, in the way that it was swaying. But eventually this pleasure wore off, and I stood, frowning with fixed determination at the swing. 

If I really wanted, I could’ve slid onto the little seat, stretched my feet out and rocked it a bit. 

But I was scared. 

My ankle was throbbing from imagined pain. 

For a brief moment, I imagined the tumble again, the world going dizzy as I fell, my chest constricted with pain as I hit the ground. 

The pain in my ankle had been worse, but I hadn’t cried out; only blinked up, accusatorily; as if I’d been pushed, instead of simply falling. 

I wanted to swing. 

But now, the world looked a little less beautiful when it was dancing. 

•••

By the time my cast was off, I no longer stood in the yard and stared: now I did that from my window, the wind strong and cold now, the summer air gone and a loping breeze coming up the driveway. 

Maple leaves tumbled to gather on the seat. 

The chain looked a little rusted. 

I turned from my window: maybe next spring, when the weather was warmer.

•••

The last time I’d seen the swing, it was May, and twilight. The stars hung like drops of cream in the sky and I hadn’t sat on the smooth wooden surface in well over a year. 

I wanted to remember it, the way that it used to be: a comfort, a friend, a thing I loved and enjoyed. 

A thing that made the world more beautiful, in a way. 

But now it was just a swing. 

My limbs were taller: my hips went past the seat and the chain loops seemed small in my fingers. 

I sat down, once, and rocked a bit. 

The rocking didn’t make the world dizzy: everything was in shadow, almost grey. 

I stopped the swing. Stood up. 

Moved silently into the house and didn’t think of the last time I had not been afraid of something that I loved. 

•••

The swing was gone when I came home from school one day: I at first, didn’t notice that it was gone from beneath the tangle of branches, but when I glanced out my window that night, I couldn’t see its shadow, ever-moving, when it was stirred by the wind. 

I walked outside: stood and stared at the empty spot where it had been and looked around, mystified. 

For a moment, I thought it had grown wings and flown away, a punishment for my neglect.

But when I woke mom she simply stared at me, sleep blinking in her eyes. 

“I threw it away.” She said. 

“It just sat there— you’re what, eleven now? I didn’t think you wanted it anymore.”

I nodded, mute. I wasn’t sure why my chest was suddenly feeling tight and sore. 

“I didn’t.” I said. “It’s fine.” 

She paused, squinting at me. And then turned over and went to sleep. 

I dreamed that night of the world slightly tilting; the grass a shade of green that only came from the soft movement of the world being swept from beneath me. 

•••

I found it by the roadside, the grass growing up around it and waiting for the garbage truck to roll around. 

It almost looked the way I’d looked when I’d gotten my cast; a little stilted and worn. The face wasn’t as glossy. The chains, I hadn’t found. 

The summer air was thick around me and the world was a little less inviting because of it. 

It would’ve been nice to sit one more time; feel the breeze, see the world gently moving around me. 

I didn’t want to leave it sitting there; I picked it up for a moment, but the thought of carrying it back seemed more wrong than leaving it, so I just held it for a while, rough splinters grazing my fingers, and then placed it back down again, the sun falling gently behind the hills. 

•••

Some summers I stand beneath the tree and look up; I imagine I’m swinging, the world a little dizzy and more beautiful. 

I picture the grass woven a different color, feel the wind tracing my cheek. 

I don’t know why I couldn’t ever get back on. 

Some things are different, after a time. Some things change, even as you change. 

I wanted my summers to be all the same. 

But now, I think I just wish that I had had the courage to realize that the best things cannot always remain the same.