Carnivals

I took Emily to Old Town in Kissimmee when she was here over the summer to visit Fun Spot. For those of you that's not familiar with Fun Spot or Old Town for that matter, they sit side by side off of 192 in Kissimmee. Fun Spot features go kart tracks and it's really like a big carnival. They have the go karts, which the kids and I love, but they also have the traditional carnival style rides as well. Pay one price and get the all you can ride unlimited armband or pay for individual tickets if you just want to do one ride. What is it about these places that makes us adults pull out our wallets and spend money like it really does grow on trees. I like to think that I'm pretty conservative with my spending but get me somewhere like Fun Spot and suddenly I'm a bigger spender then a congressional democrat. Please, nothing less then the unlimited, all day and night, go-carts AND rides armband for me and my kids! 37.00 dollars each? Chump change to be able to let my daughter (and son Lorenzo when he's here) ride till she's sick and tired of riding. We ride the go-karts and yes, we do break the rules every time we ride. We bump, we crash, we spin each other out, we try to put each other into the wall. We crash into the innocents riders that just so happen to get in our way while we are trying to get in front of each other so that we don't lose that particular race. We make the attendants blow their whistles and point at us while hurling some threats at us. We bump whoever is in front of us as we come into the station at the end of the race. We laugh and get off and then run to get back in line. After we get tired of the go karts we will walk the midway and do some of the old classics. The tilt a whirl. The bobsleds, yes, we do want to go faster. And surprise! Now we get to do it in reverse! I remember riding that ride when I was a kid. The songs then were songs that I grew up with. The songs now I don't recognize. I think one of them was Lady Gaga, maybe. As it gets dark the place takes on a life of its own. Lights flashing and sirens screaming for attention, competing with the laughs and shrieks of kids. The skill games with all the giant stuffed animals that no one ever seems to win. The air is heavy with that unmistakable smell of a carnival. Part machinery, part food. The food smells coming from the booths that are frying hamburgers and hot dogs and cheese steaks and french fries. Sausages and onions. Delectable desserts such as funnel cakes, cotton candy, candy apples, caramel popcorn and the list goes on and on. Your kid wants something? No problem. Pull out wallet, purchase item. We eat til we're about to puke and rightly should! But it's not the rides we're paying for or the food or the games or the cheap souvenirs. We're buying the experience. We are paying top dollar for the memories that we are making. We're buying time together that nothing will ever be able to erase. A long way further down the road of life we will look back at our time together and we won't remember what it cost. What we will remember is that we were together. Dad was there. Emily and Lorenzo were so young. We rode those rides and ate all that food and we laughed and we laughed! Remember when Dad crashed his go kart into the wall when he was trying to past Emily or when Lorenzo got spun around and that other kid hit him head on and his phone went flying? THAT'S what we are buying at the carnival. And those things are eternal.