Public Play

What do all the following experiences have in common?

• A leap in front of the bright yellow ginko tree that punctuates the front of the High Museum of Art and partially hides the Rodin* gifted to it after 106 museum leaders and patrons died in an airplane crash departing from an art tour of Paris the year before I was born (not to be confused with the Rodin exhibit inside the museum right now);

• Two public pianos free for the fingers;

• And another leap, this time off a swing at the only playground in the United States by playscape designer and sculptor Isamu Noguchi, built when I was 13 and now preserved and protected.

It’s public play, folks. That ability to exist in public space, and to have fun doing so.

My Master’s thesis QUESTION, which I continue to ask, is: Who gets to exist in public space?; when, where why and how?; and who gets to decide that?

Yesterday, it was me (and Disco).

@speedofbike

#bikelife #bike #publicplay #fitness #wellness #selfcare #mentalhealth #Atlanta

♬ Good Day – Nappy Roots

* You can see the Rodin in this photo of the ginkgo tree from a prior year: