Sunday Strolls: A Park Day Ritual

Lyrics

The wicker basket is by the door.
Same one your grandmother used, back in sixty-three.
Still smells a little of lemonade and time.
It’s Sunday morning. The air is different. You know what that means.

We find our oak, the one near the path with the scar from that lightning strike.
You help me spread the old checkered blanket, our own private country for the afternoon.
The sun is a warm hand on the back of your neck.
The traffic on Cherokee Avenue just fades away.
The whole city holds its breath for us.

And this is how we mark the time.
Not with clocks, but with the slow crawl of shadows on the grass.
Fried chicken in wax paper, and knees stained green.
Just the quiet hum of a hundred other families,
all doing the same beautiful, simple thing.
Our Sunday stroll. The beat of our Grant Park heart.

I push you on the swing, higher, go touch the leaves.
That rhythmic squeak of the chain is the exact same sound I remember.
And there it is... the lion's deep sigh from over the fence.
I tell you about the old days, a man with a cart, the tinkling bell,
selling boiled peanuts in a paper cone.

And this is how we mark the time.
Not with clocks, but with the slow crawl of shadows on the grass.
Fried chicken in wax paper, and knees stained green.
Just the quiet hum of a hundred other families,
all doing the same beautiful, simple thing.
Our Sunday stroll. The beat of our Grant Park heart.

Look around. See that young family over there?
That was me and my father, I swear.
And that old couple on the wooden bench, watching the world?
That will be us, someday soon.
The same sun, the same Georgia clay beneath the grass.
The same small, perfect eternity, laid out on a threadbare blanket.

The light is turning to gold now. The air is getting cool.
Time to fold up our country.
Shake out the crumbs, the blades of summer grass.
Until next Sunday.
Until next Sunday.