real play

There is a big empty field across the street from us that has become the neighborhood kids' playground. It's a field that is waiting for a housing development, when the economy comes out of its desolate winter. Until then, the kids have taken it over: bike jumps, dirt pits, forts, rock piles. It's the quintessential kid's stomping ground, complete with an abandoned baby doll that my kids tell me no one will touch because Nic peed on it one day. (nice)

When the weather is beautiful the kids head out and find random pieces of dumped junk (just last week it was a treadmill) and use them to build their forts. 

They collect leaves and grass for their food, and set up camp.

And they spend the last remaining hours of sunlight playing in their "homes".

Sometimes I sneak out there and grab some pictures and pine away at the amazing light and beg my daughter to pose just for one second. Today she obliged. (Thanks Bean)

It all reminds me of growing up across from a huge plum orchard: spending summer days out there playing "house", gorging on plums, spotting jack rabbits and snakes. The day our friends sold their orchard I cried. My family stood at the kitchen window watching the big tractors pluck out the plum trees and toss them aside.

I will have that same feeling when I see the construction trucks pulling up across the street. The days of my kid's "real play" will be plucked away and we will have to look else where for that special place where they can be free and let their imaginations run wild.