It used to seem huge. Neverending acres to explore.  A hill, a meadow, a park. And it was all right outside my back door. Memories of being barefoot, standing on the scorching concrete porch, unable to reach the doorknob. I couldn’t have been more than 3.

Everything seemed so clear and bright. The colors were so brilliant and vivid. Everything new and fresh. Nothing looks that way anymore. The flowers, the cool moist grass between my bare toes. Watch out for bees! They like the clover. Ancient and massive trees. One gave us plums. Another, peaches. There was even one that offered a bounty of wild cherries. We ate them like they were ambrosia, fingers and lips stained bloody red. The long fence line was lavish with wild honeysuckle. Pick the flower, gently nibble the tiny green end of the stem – careful, don’t break it -pull, and if you were skilled and delicate enough, you would end up with a drop of the nectar of the gods to place upon your tongue.

Hours and hours we spent there. Hot summer days when we shared lunch with our friends -whoever happened to be around. Sandwiches, hot dogs on the grill, peanut butter and saltines. Kool-aid. Popsicles. The moms, they basked like lizards in the sun. In the days before sunscreen. The swing set. The metallic smell on your hands after holding the chains. Camping expeditions, mansions made of refrigerator boxes. Dad spending the night sleeping on a lawn chair so we could rough it. Warm nights catching fireflies in mayonnaise jars, playing hide and seek, Mother may I, red light green light.

Cool, crisp cotton sheets, having dried in the breeze, caressing my freshly bathed sunkissed skin. No worries, no stress, only the peaceful slumber of a child.

Roller skating on the cement garage floor that I pretended was my private ice rink. Creating song and dance routines on the patio. I just knew I was somehow meant for the stage. Everyone said so.

Put down that book and go play outside in the sunshine. You’ll get pale. Compromise. Outside, I read the book in the shade.

Best friends sitting in a cool patch of clover, making flower crowns to wear in our long chestnut and blonde hair, princesses searching for the lucky, mutant ones. Talking about the older girls and how we couldn’t wait until we were old enough to wear make-up and date boys.

Those days would come soon enough. In the blink of an eye.

Now we were basking like lizards in the sun, reading Seventeen magazine and Judy Blume books, slathered with Hawaiian Tropic, wearing our string bikinis. My favorite one looked like macrame, very bohemian for a small town girl. Gossip, laughter, music from the FM radio playing out the bedroom window. Sugar-free lemonade and Tab. Sometimes we would even sneak a cigarette.

Standing in the kitchen near the door, leaning on the cabinet pretending to talk to my mom. It was really just an elaborate ruse so I could watch the cutest boy I had ever seen mowing the lawn behind ours. He always saw me, I always saw him, and we both pretended we didn’t. Later, he became my first real boyfriend. What were the odds of that ruse paying off? Someday he and I will reminisce about our shy, teenage ritual. He left way too early. But he is always near.

The backyard is different now. An addition added to the house, plus a tiny house they call the shop take up a lot of the space. The clover is covered with stone and moss like you would see in an English garden. Artful and painstaking beautiful. Less maintenance, they say.

But it will never be as beautiful as it was when it was filled with kids, laughter, and music. Splashing in a plastic pool. The creak of the swing set. Sunbathing moms and happy, carefree teenagers. Now only echoes and the lingering vestige of the memories our backyard still holds. Because it is so rich with history, it will always be one of the most precious places of my life. I can close my eyes and again, I’m that chestnut haired little girl wearing a crown of flowers.

Or this kid: