Swings at our park

There’s a swing set at the park near our place. Nothing fancy—just two swings, a faded plastic slide, and a patch of mulch that’s slowly losing the battle to time and little shoes. We go there often enough that the kids call it our park, as if we built it with our own hands.

This afternoon, the older one was flying—legs pumping hard, back arched, hair catching the sun. The little one insisted I push him. Harder. Then softer. Then “not like that.” I gave up trying to get it right and just followed his rhythm, which felt like the right thing anyway.

At one point, I looked up, and the light was hitting just right—everything golden and warm, the kind of light that makes even the mulch look cinematic. Both boys were laughing. For no reason. Just laughing.

And I thought: This is it. This is the good part.

But even as I felt that, I felt it slipping.

That’s the strange thing about joy. It rarely announces itself. It sneaks in through the side door while you’re tying shoes or cutting grapes in half. And by the time you recognize it—really see it—it’s already half gone, waving at you from the rearview mirror.

I don’t know how to hold onto moments like that. I try. I tell myself, remember this. I take pictures I won’t look at. I write notes in my phone. But none of it feels like enough. The moment still goes. The swing comes down.

So maybe the trick isn’t holding on. Maybe the trick is just being there while it happens. Letting it wash over you without needing to trap it in a jar.

That’s hard for me. My mind likes to wander—to rehearse things that haven’t happened yet, or replay ones that already did. But kids have this magic. They live fully in the now. A swing is not a metaphor to them. It’s just fun. And that’s holy, in its own way.

I’m learning, slowly, to follow their lead.

Today I pushed the swing. I let myself laugh when they laughed. I didn’t check my phone. I didn’t think about work. For a minute or two, I was right there, in the center of it. Wind in my face. Two voices in the air. The sky doing its quiet thing overhead.

And when we left, I didn’t feel like I had missed it.

Not this time.