“In the end, kids won’t remember that fancy toy you bought them, they will remember the time you spent with them.”
—Kevin Heath
"We don’t stop playing because we grow old, we grow old because we stop playing.”
—George Bernard Shaw
Oak Meadow Park, is considered the gem of all Los Gatos parks. It features a large 12-acre playground
including a real decommissioned USAF T-33A “T-Bird,” America’s First Jet Trainer (Nicknamed: "Shooting Star.”) Lyla inspected the outside, walked onto the wing of the jet and sat in the cockpit.
I couldn’t help thinking about my nephew Andrew (Drew) Augustine, an F-15 Crew Chief at the United States Air Force stationed in Okinawa, Japan, and his lovely wife Kaylyn, a former airman in the USAF, who now works for VSE Corporation in Okinawa.
The park also sports a scaled-down red fire engine, corkscrew slides, swings, playhouses of different sizes, BBQ and picnic facilities, a large grass field for youth soccer games, a carousel, and a one-third scale Billy Jones Wildcat railroad that offers rides on steam-engine locomotives year-round in a creek-side setting.
Whenever I want to assist Lyla on climbing a play structure she always lets me know if she doesn’t want me to help her. She pushed my hand away, and said, "No Papa, I want to do it myself.” She’s fearless. It was a very colorful day. Parents were out riding bicycles with their kids. One guy was throwing a frisbee for his dog to catch in mid-air. Lyla met a cute 2-year old like herself who shared the steering wheel of the red fire engine with her.
Dogs are not the only living creatures that need a wide berth to run and play. So do children. Before we sat down for our picnic on-the-grass, Lyla began to run toward a whimsical covered performance stage a thousand feet away where summer concerts usually take place. A man watching began to laugh, saying: “Wow, she has a mind of her own, doesn’t she.” I smiled and said, “You don’t know the half of it.” It was like chasing a running back to the goal line. When she got to the stage she commanded it. She walked all over it in a circular fashion and I encouraged her to dance. Like the decommissioned USAF Jet trainer, she is the family’s “shootings star.”
We finally had our picnic on the grass. Lyla seemed very contented as she sat on Cecile’s (Nonnie’s) lap. The three hour playtime flew by. Yes, we were tired but contented as well. I couldn’t help think about the musical lyrics of the late Paul Vance:
"When this old world gets me down and there’s no love to be found;
I close my eyes and soon I find
I’m in a playground in my mind
Where the children laugh and
The children play
And we sing a song all day.”
Lyla awakens the child in us and we give her the space to be who she is: a loving, curious, determined, joyful child who knows she is loved unconditionally.
