Because I grew up essentially feral and in a very rural area, my childhood play was essentially like this.

Though I never played on a formal playground, even an “adventure” one as there weren’t any playgrounds of any sort where I lived. Not within 10 miles, anyway. (Like I said, rural.)

I do remember asking my mother if I could allow some water to flow into the front yard, put some gasoline on top of it and light it up. That I even asked was a bit of a miracle, but I figured gasoline was very expensive to us so someone would notice if it went missing and then I would get into trouble.

She said yes, as long as I didn’t use too much.

So I constructed a makeshift dam, let the garden hose run until the water nearly overtopped my weak weir, and then poured a bunch of gasoline in. Then I made a little trail of gasoline away from the water so I didn’t set myself on fire, and lit it up.

It was quite impressive.

I was either seven or eight years old when this occurred.

As I said, I was nearly feral and the world was my adventure playground.