The Weight

 Rock. Me. Hard place.

That's a quick diagram describing my situation when it comes to the playground here at my school. You may remember a couple weeks back when I wrote about the crew of men and trucks that came out to work on the retaining wall outside our school. If you don't recall that lament, you probably remember a time when I pined for the day when the asphalt at my school could be replaced, at the very least, by new asphalt that isn't cracked and burdened by the ravages of more than a quarter century of sitting out in the rain and wind and sun. Not to mention the pitter patter of all those little feet. 

But there I went and did it. I mentioned it. Again. It's that part of keeping still for all these years. If I had moved around the district, I might have had a different perspective. I wouldn't be the institutional memory for this one spot in East Oakland. I would not have witnessed the several vain attempts to patch or give the appearance of repair. Way back when our school was "modernized," they painted the place and put in an elevator and some lovely architectural flourishes inside like wood trim and a seemingly endless run of bulletin board space. And the cables for Al Gore's Internet were finally put inside the walls instead of being stapled and zip-tied to door frames just barely out of the reach of all but the tallest of fifth graders. But during that project, our classrooms were all moved into portable trailers set up on that tired old playground and for a year or two, kids were corralled into an even tinier space of uneven, crumbling pavement. When the big rigs showed up to haul away those trailers, they left new scars. Scars that have yet to be repaired. 

Covered up? Yes. Until the next hard rain. That's how erosion works. And each winter we get a little more. And you might think that some parent group would look out on this landscape and feel the same way I do. Except they are looking at things from a different perspective. The sidewalks and streets where they live are in a near constant state of disrepair as well. The parents in the neighborhood where I work are interested in the quality of education their children are receiving. The quality of the playground is something that, when it does show up for them, is peripheral. It is not the focus of the caregivers. They want to be sure that reading, writing and math are taking place. Recess and PE don't always make that list. After six short years here, they move on and a new crop of short people appear, and I hope none of them get swallowed up by the ever-widening chasms. There is no PTA fundraiser to rescue us here. 

Which is why I started, last weekend, to create an online fundraiser for that project. I have been surprised and eternally grateful for the response I have received for the donations our expanded virtual community. Friends, family and strangers have contributed to all manner of requests, from books to a refrigerator in our staff room. What would it take to get a new playground? You can't find out without asking.

Except the GoFundMe never got finished. This Monday I received the news that that crew that is currently busy with the retaining wall would be turning their attention to our playground once they had finished all that masonry. This put a kink in my plans to hotwire one of their tractors and commence the work myself, but in good faith I chose to wait and see. 

What will happen next? The Cubs won the World Series. Maybe it's finally time to get our playground resurfaced. 

I can wait. 

Sigh.