I was driving around with my kids yesterday when my daughter asked if I went to Lake Fenton the whole time I went to school. I explained that I didn't move to the district until I was in 8th grade, and that prior to being a Lake Fenton Blue Devil, I was a Durand Railroader! Since we didn't have any plans I asked if she wanted to see where I grew up, she said yes, so with that we were off on a mini-road trip!

We went by my old elementary schools, Robert Kerr and Doyle Knight, and my old junior high school, which is now a retirement home. (How weird would it have been to go to school there, then get old and move in?) Then we ended up at Trumble Park, a park that I spent a good chunk of my childhood growing up in Railroad City U.S.A.

We were there for only 20 minutes or so, but it brought back years and years of great memories. Among the new modernized jungle gyms, I took great delight in seeing some of the playground equipment that I had played on more than 30 years later!

We all have our inner-child, and I suppose mine is much more flamboyant than the average person my age. The irony of the whole thing was that being there with my kids on my 37th birthday, I felt more like a seven-year-old! Here I am supposed to be getting older, yet it felt like quite the opposite. I crawled into a concrete pipe that I used to be able to literally walk through. And the kids and I got to go an the same swingset, and swing to the exact same view that I did 35 years prior. It was amazing!

So if you're ever feeling like your getting old, or your too old, here's what you can do. Go back to the first playground you ever set foot on, whether you go with your kids, someone else's kids, or even by yourself. Just look around, take it all in, and let the memories flow... let your inner child go wild! If any of the same equipment is still there, you may look like a fool trying it out again, but you'd be a bigger fool not to!

The simple things in life are the best, and that quick visit to Trumble Park was worth more, and meant more to me than any day at the beach! Not only did it let me feel like a kid again, but something even better hit me as we were driving home. Hayli's simple question about my schooling turned into something I didn't expect. Even though my kids aren't growing up Durand, they now have the same childhood memories of the same swingset in the same park as I do!  That's fantastic!!

loading...

More From Cars 108