Getting into the swing of things

When you give somebody a new swing, as we did our son, daughter-in-law and granddaughter this Christmas, implicit is the swing includes installation. It’s in the fine print, the sort of which can’t even be seen through reading glasses with 120 magnification.

Sam and Lauren recently moved into a new house, one block from their old one. The front yard is ringed by Chinese elms with branches ready to embrace the world and sturdy enough on which to hang a new swing.

Park swings are great but there’s nothing better than a tree swing, this one being Little Tikes Disc Swing Displayer. The only thing that beats a tree swing is one that deposits the adventurer into a river, lake or water hole.

Neighbors have one down the street. The swing hangs from 12 feet of rope, which allows kids to soar from sidewalk to street and back again.

“We had some tree trimmers over and they volunteered to put it up,” he said.

When are they coming back? It looks like you could use a re-trim. If they do return, send them west and we’ll see if we can get the addon-neighbor price.

“Dad, Nora has been asking when you’re going to put up the swing,” Sam said.

I liked her confidence. You want your grandchildren to think you can do anything and you’re immortal despite the sometimes unsettling evidence to the contrary. This was no time to disappoint her.

Tree swing projects start with a ladder and unfortunately I have several. Ignore the 5-footer unless you want your swing to be the laughing stock of the neighborhood.

If your swing is too low not only do your children and grandchildren not want to swing on it, but kids passing by keep right on passing by.

I brought the 14-foot aluminum extension ladder that has trouble written all over it. There are several ways to hurt yourself with an extension ladder. You can get your fingers or hands caught in the rungs during the course of extending the ladder and require multiple operations on your hands, all of which will undoubtedly fail and doom you to type with your nose.

You can simply fall off because you haven’t secured the ladder after extending it or, having secured it, fall off anyway after you look down and realize you’ve made a tactical error by leaving Mother Earth.

“Dad, do you know what you’re doing?” Sam asked.

Why would you ask? Do I not look like I know what I’m doing? I arrived at the job walk with the ladder in the back of the truck. I’m wearing boots and work clothes. I brought leather gloves. Do you think I’m just winging it here? There’s usually a moment in a son or daughter’s life they become mature enough to suspect their parents are clueless, regardless of how much hands-on experience they should have had by this time.

Sam, first we have to tie the yellow rope — if I’m not mistaken, a three-strand polypropylene rope — to the swing. I will tie the only knot I know how to tie, the one you learn when you’re 5 and then I will back it up with a second knot that will ostensibly strengthen the first knot but may weaken it thus causing the swing to fall off on its own accord.

We extended the ladder, making sure we didn’t have it upside down, and then leaned it against the tree. The top of the ladder was still 5 feet shy of the branch we had chosen, which would afford the swing several feet of clearance. You don’t want a child banging into the tree and knocking herself out.

We both looked up. It was way up there. Way up there has never looked more way up there.

Sam climbed the tree as a 34-year-old might and when he reached the end of the ladder grabbed onto the tree. The problem was, we (I) had no plan. How would he hold on and tie a knot around the tree and make sure the rope was the right length?

Sam climbed down and I did something that proved years of hands-on experience can lead to wisdom — I called somebody.

Somebody who had hung a few swings. Somebody who reinforced it with a chain over the top of the branch. Somebody who put up a swing that will allow kids in the neighborhood to touch the Bakersfield sky.