Liam, Bono, and Me

This one comes right out of our Frederick, MD backyard.

#happysonsday #susanstrasser #susanstrasserblog #amwriting

We have a swing set which was in heavy rotation for about five years and now often sits unused.

Last Friday the kids had a half day. After lunch, I went back there to hang out. They are so damn cute. They had set up a picnic blanket with their favorite toys and books.

Anyway, I sat down and chatted with them, looked at Hazel’s book. We began taking turns reading pages of it. Liam was doing something on the tree swing (that’s only a year old) and kept asking me to watch… so it was: read a page or so of Hazel’s graphic novel, look up at Liam, and repeat.

We were in our first spell of fantastic “Fall Fever” weather. (You know, like Spring fever… the same idea… balmy, 0% humidity sunny, mostly blue-sky days with a few passing white tufts of cloud that make it almost impossible to be inside, or if so, it feels like a crime!) And I loved that my children fell back to an old Covid habit of picnicking in our yard.

Eventually, Liam wanted me to push him on the tree swing, but I was feeling nostalgic, and proposed the old swing set instead.

“C’mon, it’ll be like the old days!” I said.  

So, a few pushes from behind, and I began to sing.

I have no exact idea why, but for Liam’s entire childhood, when I push him on the swing, I like to sing and whoop a’ la Bono from the band U2.

“Woo, hoo! Woo, hoo!” I sing, imitating Bono, from the 1984 song Bad. (You probably know this song but not the title. No one knows the title unless you are a die hard U2 fan. After thirty years of being an avid U2 fan, I still have to stop and think about it lol)  

Anyway, when I get to pushing Liam, and he’s like “higher!” and I watch him go higher than my head and am a little nervous that I am going to hurt my son and he’s gonna fly out and crack his head open and it will be all my fault but God this is so fun….

Long story short, pretty sure he likes my “woo, hoos! Woo-hoo!”

And I sing like Bono:

If I could through myself

Set your spirit free

I’d lead your heart away

See you break, break away

Into the light

And into the day

WOO HOO! WOO HOO!