A childhood memory.

FLYING

We called it a seesaw
but it was a big plank
twelve feet long.
eight inches wide
four inches thick
At each end, the wood curved into seats
Underneath in the middle of the plank were
two s-shaped hinges that hooked onto a green metal pipe
cemented into the ground
four feet high
I want to be precise about all the measurements because
once Lynnie and I climbed on,
it became a bucking horse throwing us four feet in the air,
it was a balance beam where we stood stiller than still
four feet above the ground, it was
a place to talk back and forth, up and down
about everything, as best friends do.
Sometimes we would lift the board
so it was no longer hooked to the pipe and swerve it side to side,
trying to throw each other off.
No, that’s not quite right.
We’d bring each other to the edge of being thrown off
but we never did.
We never felt the sudden terrible weightlessness of the other disappearing.
Instead we bounced and swerved the board so the other
could lift higher and higher, almost flying.
Really, I guess, it was flying.
This trust between us.
But we didn’t call it that.

©Lindsey Lane