There was a small field, with a swingset in the far corner. A few girls were crying with delight as they played tag and stomped in the mud puddles. Their mothers yelled after them to keep their dresses clean, but the girls never listened; they were having too much fun. A small group of boys played football with their fathers in the corner adjacent to the swings. Occasionally, a child would fall, but that was okay; Mom always had bandages.
    But those times were over. The park I used to play in when I was young was now reduced to a pile of splintered wood and a graffitied slide, with dead, yellowed grass everywhere. I sat at a crumbling stone bench, wondering how all of this went wrong, when I heard a voice from the gates of the place. It was a little girl, pulling her mother’s arm and yelling happily.
    “Come on, Mom!” she exclaimed. “I wanna be here first for my party!”
    The girl saw me and waved. I returned the gesture, asking myself why anyone would ever want to host any sort of celebration here.
    As if answering my question, she dug into her mother’s purse and pulled out a Tupperware case of acorns and some bottles of water, then sat down.
    After a few minutes, more kids, who I assumed were the girl’s friends, started filing in. Some of them were jumping with excitement. Once they were all situated, the first girl to arrive gave two acorns and one bottle of water each to everyone else. Her mother gave her a plastic shovel, which she began to dig a hole with.
    The other partygoers followed suit. Some brought shovels, like the birthday girl, but most just used their hands. Once they dug the hole deep enough, they dropped one acorn in, covered it with dirt, and watered it before restarting the cycle with the remaining seed.
    The birthday girl immediately sprinted to me after finishing her gardening, and offered me an acorn.
    “Mister, would you like to plant a tree?” she asked. Her mother followed close behind, apologizing profusely for her daughter bothering me.
    “I’m really sorry about my daughter, she’s just really excited for her birthday,” she said.
    I smiled. “Oh, don’t worry. She’s doing a great thing for this place. I practically lived here when I was a kid, so it’s nice for me to see someone trying to fix it after all these years.” I turned my attention towards the girl, who was sitting cross-legged in front of me, listening to everything I was saying. “I’d love to plant that acorn,” I said happily.
    I took the seed and put it near the swings, my favorite part of the park, then waited for everyone else to finish their own planting. I had them gather around so I could ask them to please keep this park beautiful as long as they could. I told them my story of how this park used to be grand, but it had been neglected for decades and was reduced to what they saw today. They all listened intently. I smiled again. Maybe there was hope for this park after all.