Swing Sets to Diapers

Remember those old aluminum swing sets that everyone had in their back yard? The swing set consisted of a metal slide, then two single swings, a two-person swing, and a random monkey bar held up by chains. These swing sets were obviously built for safety; they were practically a metal lightning rod stuck in the middle of a flat backyard. Storms rolling in from seventy miles away were eyeing up these jungle gyms filled with happy-go-lucky children. After the rain passed, they would insta-rust. The whole set was held together by four slowly decaying bolts. 

My cousin David had one of those sets in his back yard when we were kids. I remember playing on it every time we went over his house. We would go really high on the swings to where the back legs of the whole set  (which were probably supposed to be anchored into the dirt) would lift about eight inches off the ground. We called those "cherry-bumps". After dislodging the set from the earth, we moved on to jumping off the swing for distance. We alternated swinging on the swings to see who could heave themselves the farthest from the set. 

As unsafe as it was, playing on that swing set was a blast for two six year old's. The adventures on that backyard set are also the earliest memories I have of me and David hanging out together. 

Flash forward 20 years.

Me and David are hanging out together again. This time each of us has a wife and he has newborn twins - one boy, one girl - and we're all in a hospital room celebrating the new births. Wait a sec, what happened? I was just trying to beat your last jump off the swing and now you're changing the diaper of a baby that's 48 hours old. YOUR baby that's 48 hours old! 

This sounds like something out of a Kenny Chesney song. One minute we're playing in the back yard at six years old, then the next there's baby twins and an exhausted wife. I recall watching David change his son's diaper and thinking, where did you learn to do that? It was a flawless change too. Diaper off, wipe, clean, new diaper, done. The old diaper was even folded perfectly in that weird football-looking shape. 

This is a whole new stage for us. No more aluminum swing sets to play on, just plastic and wooden ones to build. Don't blink.