Pangs of longing for the local playground

Anetwork of walking paths sprawls out in every direction from our house in suburban Ottawa, along creeks and through little patches of forest. The paths are dotted with little playgrounds that are covered in warning signs about the pandemic.

When I think back to normal life, Reyna was never really a big fan of the playgrounds. We would always stop at them, but the fun wore off pretty quickly. The swings got old after a few minutes. The slide burned her bare legs and the static electricity made her hair stand up straight like an adorable little Medusa. The random kids at the park weren’t as fun as her best friend and, besides, they had their own friends.

Our normal walk takes us past at least two playgrounds, sometimes three if we take the longer loop. One large multi-storey structure stands out in the middle of a huge patch of grass like the Crystal Palace. Of course, it sits empty.

Reyna is three years old, but she has a firm grasp on what’s going on. The daycare is closed because of the sickness. We need to keep our distance. Family members appear at the window sometimes, but we can’t hug them. A man once ran past her on the walking path a little too close for comfort and she asked me, with a kind of exasperation, if that meant we were sick now. There’s lots of other stuff that we miss with a deeper yearning. Her grandparents, for one. Family coffee at Tim Hortons every Saturday. The playdates with her best friend, which allowed me to eavesdrop on the bizarre and fascinating conversations of three year olds. Of course, we miss those things more, but it’s a relentless longing that’s just part of the atmosphere now. It’s a persistent fog our eyes have adjusted to.

When a playground appears in the distance, we both feel a sharp pang. We used to visit them by happenstance, when we stumbled upon one during a walk, and that’s what we don’t have anymore. Whims are harder to follow.

I’m pining for the first day she can play in the park, get bored of it after five minutes and then move onto something else.