and this is why you never let go of the swing

So, it turns out it really is called Pig Park (see previous post). I learned that after Kiddo and I went there to have an adventure just our two selves. It's only about a block away so the likelihood that I will get lost is extremely low. Though the likelihood that something will go horribly wrong when we are by ourselves and don't really have any understanding of where to go or who to call in an emergency is surprisingly high.

Anyway, because Mimi was out with her dad and Kiddo had had all the Japanese Cartoon Network that I could stand, we (I) decided we were going to head to Pig Park. It's a small park with not much more than a couple of swings, a slide that looks like it was repurposed from an assembly line

The Langstrom 7″ wrench can be used with the Findlay sprocket.

and three cement pigs that were once painted vibrant colors but probably haven't been repainted since Mimi was a kid and played in the park in the '70s.

Hello Piggy.

There isn't any grass to speak of, the ground being primarily hard-packed dirt. I'm quite fond of its derelict charm but Mimi is mostly disappointed in her old 'hood and its apparently low opinion of the kids who live here.

Something you should know about our daughter is that she is koo-koo for swings. Ever since she was itty-bitty she could get on a swing and just go. And go. And go some more. In the last couple of months she got pretty good at the "big kid" swings, too. We've even managed to do a few "underdogs" on the big kid swings and she loves it.

It all seems like innocent fun...

One unfortunate hold-over from her bucket-swing days, though, is that she sometimes likes to let go of the chain in mid-swing to point something out to us. We've been lucky in that we catch her early and shout, "DON'T LET GO OF THE SWING!" (there may or may not be an f-bomb somewhere in that sentence on occasion) and she grabs hold before the swing goes anywhere without her.

And because I'm terrible at telling stories you probably already know where this is going. So here we go.

We get to the park and head straight to the swing. "Push me high!" comes the command and who am I to disobey? So we're pushing and swinging and laughing, and right when the swing is at the highest-point of its parabola and Kiddo's back is parallel to the ground and she is as far away from me as she can be while still on the swing, something by the park entrance catches her eye and she -- say it with me -- lets go of the swing.

What happened next took either one second or four hours.

As soon as she let go she realized her mistake. But the swing had already begun it's trip back from it's highest point and instead of putting her right hand back on the right chain, she swung it over to join her left hand on the other side. Not a terrible idea in theory, but she whipped her right hand across her body so quickly that the momentum, combined with the now backward trajectory of the swing, pulled her off the swing completely. I can never erase from my mind the look of absolute terror on her face at that moment.

So now she's about six feet in the air (which may not be that much, but when you are barely 3-feet high yourself... well, just imagine falling twice your own height) with her left hand holding the swing and the rest of her body hanging in the air, parallel to the ground. And down she came.

She hit the ground just ahead of the swing (the crazy, '60s-era hard plastic swing that weighs about four pounds) and I managed to get to her and block the swing with my knee (ouch) so it wouldn't hit her in the head and make matters worse. I picked her up, took a deep breath and said, "Let me see your face."

Did I mention that blood makes me fainty? It do.

I am happy to report that there was just a small scrape on her nose, one just above her lip and I could see all of her teeth and they were all whole. While there was no blood to be seen, she had eaten no small amount of dirt.

I whisked the screaming child over to the water fountain and made her-rinse-and spit a few times. She was able to stand at the water-fountain unassisted while I tried to get the damn thing to a pressure that made sense. Like the rest of the park, it's old-timey and the water shoots straight up from the spigot. Too little pressure and you can't get a drink. Too much pressure and it hits you in the back of the throat and you choke. Somehow I managed to get her mouth rinsed.

Then trying to not look like a kidnapper hauling a screaming child out of a park (nobody was in the park when it happened so now I had to walk the block back home while trying to assure all the lookie-loos that I had the legal right to carry this screaming child anyplace I wanted to) we headed back to the house. I wiped her face, made her wiggle all her fingers, cleaned her scraped knee (clearly the point of impact, based on the size of the scrape) and put no less than six band-aids on her. Her flair for the dramatic was as keen as ever. She was fine.

So then we went back to the couch to watch more Japanese Cartoon Network until she passed out. Then she woke up for dinner and went upstairs to do karaoke with her cousins.

Two people who will always be cooler than her parents.

Then today we rode a carousel and before it began I said, "Don't let go." She replied, "Why?"

Gooooood night, everybody!