A Utopian Moment And The Age of Imitation

Sixty degrees, the twenty-third of October in Rockland, Maine, at noon. Fewer than a dozen very young children and their parents on the playground under a wispy, filtered sky. The mostly-gone leaves are orange and crackling with the end of their energy cycle. It is neither warm nor cold. The children are all scrambling up walls and down slides, swinging and hiding. The parents are following, seeking, laughing with their own and others and each other. Some join the group and some go. Everyone is wearing sweaters. It feels like a village. When I realized what was happening I tried to live down deep inside it and save it in my memory forever. It was ideal happiness. A moment of perfect bliss.