Drawing on imagination to pass time on a warm spring day
It was April and except for a few piles on the side of the garage, the snow in our yard was finally gone. The grass was still asleep but you could smell the earth coming to life underneath.
I sat on the porch wearing a sweatshirt and enjoying the warmth of the sun that drifted across my legs.
My sister was sitting beside me lacing up her sneakers. She had gotten a box of chalk for Easter and with my assistance, had a plan to draw great murals on our asphalt driveway.
As nine- and ten-year-olds, we could fill just about an entire day engaging in a project such as this.
Out in the garage I found a push broom and my sister directed me to the area she wanted cleared of sand and stones so we could begin working.
The broom swishing across the driveway was the only sound that could be heard.
My sister sat cross-legged on the freshly cleaned pavement and placed her brightly colored bricks of chalk on an overturned Frisbee.
We had no previous discussions on what we were going to create.
We simply picked the colors of chalk we wanted to use and started to scratch our individual images.
We scrawled a square around each image which resulted in an overall pattern that looked like a huge hopscotch board.
It took almost two hours and every last stick of chalk to form the world’s most giant hopscotch board.
Once completed, a day-long hopscotch match commenced.
The board was so large that it had several pitching stations for us to toss from.
Since it was just the two of us playing, we made up our own rules. I wanted to see how fast I could make it through the fifty or more squares while my sister’s quest was to hop the entire board with a single toss.
As she started—and restarted—I hopped so quickly that I tumbled to the ground and cut my elbow.
I wished we had more chalk so we could have extended the game board out into the street. Instead, I challenged myself by pitching the stone markers with my left hand.
Then I fetched an old pogo stick from the back of the garage and attempted to spring from one square to the next.
We were grateful for the spring sunshine that helped to clear the driveway. It enabled us to free our imaginations and empty that box of chalk.
