Community Art: What is art really?

Swings, slides and monkey bars. The perfect childhood dream. Baldwin Park is a place of memories, love and laughter. Every summer when I was a child I would go run around in the sprinklers with my siblings, laughing and playing, after our long bike ride to the park. My mom would sit and watch us from a bench, where we would go after tiring ourselves out and eat her delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Other days, we would spend hours in the sandbox, only to return home trailing sand behind us. We would ride on the little springy animals, always fighting for the cute little rhino.

As we grew older and became too lazy to walk to the park, we didn’t go as much, but there were still days when I would take my siblings and chase them through the grassy fields before reaching the park gates. And then we would run inside, always a race to the best swing…We would try to “beat” each other by seeing who could swing the highest. My little sister, Angelinna would always jump off, and bruise herself all over the place. Returning home, we’d have to explain to our mom that we didn’t beat her up. The playground did. But she loved it anyway. We all did. Even now, after moving to a different town, with its own park and its own swings, I still would rather go back to our beloved Baldwin Park.

Back to the jungle gym I fell off as a child and busted my gums open on, swallowing cedar chips. Back to the bench on which I had my first kiss. Back to the slide that was as tall as a giant and scary as a monster to my three-foot tall self. Back to every family picnic we had in the fields. Back to the summer days and the cooling fountains. Back to the beautiful fountain in the middle of the park that we always wanted to swim in, but knew we couldn’t. I want to go back.

Now some people may read this, and say, “a park isn’t art.” But really, it is. I mean look at any park, and you’ll see the vivid colors and the beautiful shapes, and the way everything fits perfectly together. Baldwin Park had the biggest influence on our community. It was where little kids learned how to ride their bikes, where rebellious teenagers ran away from home to, where older teenagers and adults took tennis lessons, and where grandparents took their grandchildren to spend the day. Everyone who lives in Baldwin know Baldwin Park by heart: Which path leads where, and which bench not to sit on.

Baldwin Park is always going to be in my memories, the best part of my neighborhood, one of the best parts of my childhood. I’ll never forget it. It was a landmark not to be missed, taking up half of the Harbor. Baldwin wouldn’t be Baldwin without Baldwin Park.