Playgrounds have changed so much over my lifetime. Sturdy brightly colored plastic has replaced the rusty metal of my childhood. Heights have been lowered, safety has been prioritized, and it’s all for the good. But, when I think about times spent on the playground as a kid, I can’t help but miss some of the most memorable things. As a 1960’s & 70’s era child, I was delighted to spend many unsupervised hours on daring playground adventures. As a 1990’s & 2000's parent, I was horrified to think back on it. I I don’t have any actual pictures of my playground excursions, but I have scoured the internet to find some that will do. Let's take a trip to Playgrounds of Yesteryear.
Slides. Slides were extremely high. Climbing up the metal steps, all the way to the top, was a daunting Mt. Everest-style trek. Once you committed to go up the ladder, there was no turning back. There were always kids lined up on the lower rungs, waiting for you to ascend, one step at a time. Once you reached the top and sat down, there was little hesitation before you shoved off and swooped down the slippery slide. Except when the slide wasn’t slippery, and you got stuck halfway down. Then, you had to scooch yourself jerkily to the bottom, hoping the next slider didn’t loose patience and kick off early. Sitting on a sheet of wax paper as you slid down helped keep the slide good and slippery. We never knew where the wax paper came from, but it always appeared. If the sun was out, man, that metal slide would get H.O.T. Ouch!
Swings. Swings seemed higher than many you see nowadays. Some playgrounds had preposterously long chains for the swings. When you got up to full swinging speed, you were really soaring through the sky. We alternated between sitting-style swinging and standing-style swinging. Brave swingers knew how to judge the exact moment when the swing was not too high, but just high enough, that you could jump out, sailing your body through the air, arms flailing, without breaking anything on the landing. Sometimes you could stick a landing standing up, other times you had to tuck and roll just before impact, to reduce injury.
How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!
Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
River and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside —
Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown —
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!-- The Swing by Robert Louis Stevenson
SeeSaw. Has anyone ever gotten on a seesaw with another person of the same weight? Not me. I was forever the kid whose side sat flat on the ground or, worse, the kid whose side rose so quickly that all I could do was sit in the air, kicking my legs around trying to bring my side back down. Somehow the up and down concept never played out right. And, the hard bump, when my side came down to the ground, was quite uncomfortable. I found seesaws to be very frustrating.
Merry-Go-Round. The old-fashioned playground merry-go-round. Have you been on one? It was singularly the most dangerous piece of playground equipment ever invented. It was a large circular metal disc with handlebar rails. When playing on the merry-go-round, you would find yourself in one of 3 positions, which I have identified and named accordingly.
1) You could be a Rider. This meant that you got onto the merry-go-round before it started spinning. You would stake your claim to a spot, standing against a rail, and then hold on to the handlebar for dear life, trying not to be hurled off while the merry-go-round spun at top speed.
2) You could be a Spinner. This meant that you stood on the ground and held a handlebar, then started running around the merry-go-round to spin it as fast as you could. You ran around and around and around, building the speed with each rotation. Strong legs and strong arms were important for Spinners. Many times, the equipment would get going so fast that the Spinner would trip and get dragged down with a few head thunks to boot.
3) You could be a Jumper. Jumping off was easy. You let go of the handlebar and jumped off, often landing in a momentum-twisted heap. Jumping on was another story. Some Jumpers came late to the party, and simply tried to get on the merry-go-round after it had already started. Some Jumpers, though, were daredevils who intentionally tried to succeed at mounting a merry-go-round that was at full tilt, maximum speed. Jumpers used the same skills that cowboys and bandits and various players in old westerns used to jump into the open railcar of a moving train. Only, they did it running in a circle, instead of running along a straight train track. The trick to jumping onto the merry-go-round was timing the exact millisecond when you were running at the perfect pace to grab the handlebar and throw your legs onto the surface of the equipment without tripping or being dragged behind, or worse, underneath. Many attempts at jumping on ended in scrapped knees, bruises, and damaged pride.
Oh, and one more thing: the goal of most Spinners was to crank the merry-go-round fast enough to keep Jumpers from jumping on and to cause Riders to lose their grip so that they would be flung off the merry-go-round. As soon as a spinning session ended, all Riders, Spinners, and Jumpers staggered around in a dizzy stupor until their equilibriums were restored and they geared up for another go. Good times, good times.
Bouncy Horse. Although this wasn’t on the playground, it was a favorite toy for gross motor development. The Bouncy Horse ride was a plastic horse mounted on a frame, held in place by 4 large springs. You sat on the horse to bounce, and it was very bouncy and very squeaky. Every kid who sat on the bouncy horse got pinched by the flexing of the spring coils. Or scraped by a protruding piece of metal. At full rip-roaring bounce, you could make the whole bouncy horse hop up and down, frame and all, scratching up the floor. Ka-thunk, ka-thunk.
If you have been living on this great big planet for many years, you probably remember other questionable playground options. Over time, safety experts determined new guidelines for playgrounds. Nowadays, parents can rest assured that children are entering regulated areas with no obvious dangers. Not to say that a kid cannot get hurt on the playground, but precautions are usually in place. When I supervise kids on the playground, whether in my family, or in my classroom, I like to see them explore a little further, try to do something they haven’t tried before, use the freedom of the playground equipment, exercise their whole bodies, be a little bit daring. I am glad that safety is a priority these days, but, I do have a touch of nostalgia for the playgrounds of my youth.