Strong Enough to Fly

During my Saturday morning saunter, I pass a Dad and child doing their “let Mom sleep in this morning” walk. Maybe two years old, the little curly brown-haired girl looks at me like I am the Sasquatch. No fear, just curious. She is safely strapped into one of those seats that moves seamlessly – unless you are a grandparent – from the stroller to a car’s back seat to the cockpit of a fighter jet. Plus, Dad shuffles close by, one hand on the stroller, the other scrolling his phone.

Just down the hill at the park, another father on duty, one hand on his phone, the other pushing his child in the kiddie swing. The child tries to catch her father’s eye, but the screen wins his attention, so she hangs over the edge of the swing and looks at the clouds, the birds, and anything else that interests her. Just keep the swing moving, Daddy!

At our vacation spot in Parksville, through the sliding glass door, I can see an old swing set. Most times of the day, the swings host children. The set probably wouldn’t meet the criteria for any modern elementary school playground. Our grandchildren cannot leave it alone—pool, swings, food. Rinse and repeat until dusk.

I remember. The second-hand swing set my Dad found and assembled in our backyard. My mother never liked it and deemed it unsafe because none of the supporting legs were anchored. And we created dust clouds when we dragged our feet.

Regardless, it was fun, though the more adventurous dares were saved for the swings at the park.

Stand in the seat for greater leverage, height and speed. Sit and twist so the chains coil—release and spin.

How high? Could anyone ever go high enough to over the top bar? How high and fast before launching out of the seat to fly? Extra points if you landed on your feet.

Of course, such feats required an audience, a community to cheer, to warn, to tease, and to run for help in case of scraped knees, banged heads or broken bones. Noses and teeth were most susceptible if one got too close to pumping feet. It happens.

I was astounded that, for some, that drive to circle the bar never fades. Kiiking, the Estonian extreme-swing sport, involves a very tall, rigid swing with long steel arms. The goal is to swing through a full 360° rotation, going over the top. The longer the swing arms, the more difficult the attempt. The reported world-record height is 7.43 metres from the feet. Kiiking perfectly captures this urge to push limits while staying within a defined structure—testing just how far you can go, but always within the frame that makes the challenge possible. (1)

Sometimes, at night in Parksville, after the small children were in bed, one or two teenage girls would retreat and sit gently rocking on the swing. Quiet usually, perhaps seeking a safe place, a quiet place, a space of their own?

Those who investigate such things identify the vestibular stimulation from a swing’s back-and-forth movement as its main attraction.

I guess. More simply, swings can be both fun and comforting—excitement without much danger. Fly high, manageably.

Within the defined space of the swing set, imaginations soar, and joy bubbles. Personal power emerges in the progression from “push me again, Papa” to watch me launch into orbit—danger identified and engaged.

I am often amazed by the creativity and wonder of children, especially small children, and their ability to explore and to expand, to imagine what might be.

In the famous 1999 “Hole in the Wall” experiment, Dr. Sugata Mitra placed a high-speed PC in a hole in a wall with a touchpad facing out; a protective hood covered the internet-connected device, left without instructions. Within hours of turning the computer on, local children—most of whom spoke no English and had never seen a computer before—discovered it and began experimenting. The amazing results demonstrated that children can learn complex technology and concepts when given access and allowed curiosity. Just like the swing set invites children to test the boundaries of what is possible within a safe frame, the computer in the wall offered a doorway into exploration within clear limits.

The swing and the computer provide minimal structure and bounded freedom. For a few decades, we defined freedom as the absence of structure, implying that creativity and imagination could only take root and soar outside a framework. But now, in this time of eroding institutions and the relentless tsunami of information, the collapse of structure does not necessarily bring freedom but chaos and isolation.

Once again, we can learn from children.

The boundaries of a swing offer freedom. Its frame holds the chains. The seat gives us somewhere to stand or sit. The arc defines the territory. Within those limits, we can pump higher, twist, experiment, take risks, fall, try again—and perhaps, for a moment, fly.

The computer in the wall offered something similar: not unlimited freedom, but a door into possibility. Good structures make exploration possible. They give us somewhere from which to think.

That little girl in the stroller looked at me with solemn curiosity. Her father was absorbed in the small glowing world in his hand.

I hope she gets to discover another kind of world.

One with swings.

One with clouds and birds and scraped knees.

One where someone notices when she looks up and says, “Look!”

One where there is enough structure beneath her to let her imagination soar.

Freedom is not found beyond every boundary, but within relationships and structures strong enough to hold us while we learn to fly.

……

(1) Season 1, Episode 8, “It’s Baltic Outside” of the Apple TV series Long Way Home, with Ewan McGregor and Charlie Boorman

A Blessing

Remember the relationships that steady and give freedom.

Claim the space to wonder, to risk, to fall, to try again, and to look up. 

May there always be someone nearby who notices, who watches, who cheers, and who says, “Look!” 

And may the structures that hold us never become cages, but become the places from which our imaginations can take flight. Amen.

*Chat GPT assisted with the development of the blessing