It’s marvelous how we remember the way the metal of the monkey bars felt on our hands, how we flipped with our legs wrapped around the steel, and how it felt when we couldn’t flip anymore without smacking our faces in the sand. How it felt to grow up, how it felt to grow. The way bones ached, and Nickelodeon and Kid’s Cuisine felt like Friday night freedom. When feet couldn’t reach the ground to push and pull the swing, and then, suddenly, they did. When the playground was a castle then it was a keychain. How tag made hearts race, and you hoped the boy you liked would decide you’re it, but instead, he made fun of the mole on your arm. The one your grandma gave you, and hers before that. When you started to learn what shame was, before you grew old enough to get over it, when over was something you did in jump rope, and losing your stuffed animal to a girl who stole it was the biggest loss you could feel because grief wasn’t a word you felt yet. When you gathered criss-cross applesauce on the carpet shorter than eyebrow hair, the way it scratched your skin, but you could sit there for hours, and nothing grew stiff. When your librarian read “Where the Red Fern Grows” to you, but you must not have paid attention because the movie made you cry like you didn’t know the story at all. When your librarian felt as important as the President, and so did your teachers, before we started telling our kids teachers aren’t worth being, because they don’t make money. Before we felt, exactly what that meant.