Sometimes she thought she would wake up in the morning to a commercial break.
Magic Paradise
The earliest memory I have of a family outing is the first time I went to Magic Paradise. Magic Paradise is a kid-sized amusement park with rides, games, and actors who dress up and walk around the park. It was divided into four sections. The east was a winter wonderland with a cheerful Snow Queen, elves, and animatronic reindeer. The west end was a Jurassic jungle with dinosaurs, a volcano, and recorded animal sounds that chirped and roared as you walked between the boulders and over-sized plants. The north side was outer space and alien-themed. Astronauts greeted you and showed you swings that orbited Earth and a shuttle headed for Pluto. The south side, where the entrance was, hosted a carnival with games, a Ferris wheel, a petting zoo, popcorn and cotton candy stands, and a miniature train that you could ride through the rest of the park.
I went to Magic Paradise with my parents and my cousin John. He was nine years old at the time, and I was four. We visited the Snow Queen first and ate snow cones, and then we headed for the volcano.
There was a man-made lake around the volcano, and then the mountain towered on its own island in the middle of the lake. You couldn't actually walk to the volcano, but there were log boats that took you around the island.
I know now that the log boats were part of a ride and were attached to tracks under the water. But at four years old, I thought you could actually steer them, and so I was a little concerned when my parents let John sit at the steering wheel.
He took us (or so I thought) along the edge of the lake and the animatronic triceratops roared at us because we were too close to her nest of eggs. John didn't even flinch and twisted the steering wheel and we went back toward the island.
The volcano looked like it was erupting but no lava spilled from the top. The "lava" was a combination of clever lighting and smoke but even so, it looked cool. John drove us past models of huge blue and green birds with moving beaks and recorded chirping. After we rounded the island, the boat came to a stop. We stepped back onto the pavement, and I was impressed with my cousin's captain-ship.
The thing about Magic Paradise was, I probably knew these things couldn't exist together in the same place. The carnival was ordinary enough, but I knew there couldn't be snow-covered sleighs in the middle of summer. I didn't think NASA could actually launch a spaceship from the park, and I was pretty sure humans couldn't make it to Pluto in a real spaceship. And of course, I knew dinosaurs were extinct.
But for that afternoon, I could believe in all of these things, all at the same time. I didn't have to worry about what was real or not because we were in Magic Paradise.
The summers in between high school, I worked at Magic Paradise and I could see how the park's reality-bending delighted children. The magic didn't work for me anymore, but sometimes I wish it would. Some days I wish there was a Magic Paradise for adults to visit and forget about what did and did not fit into reality. Sometimes a complete suspension of belief was exactly what I needed.
I went to Magic Paradise with my parents and my cousin John. He was nine years old at the time, and I was four. We visited the Snow Queen first and ate snow cones, and then we headed for the volcano.
There was a man-made lake around the volcano, and then the mountain towered on its own island in the middle of the lake. You couldn't actually walk to the volcano, but there were log boats that took you around the island.
I know now that the log boats were part of a ride and were attached to tracks under the water. But at four years old, I thought you could actually steer them, and so I was a little concerned when my parents let John sit at the steering wheel.
He took us (or so I thought) along the edge of the lake and the animatronic triceratops roared at us because we were too close to her nest of eggs. John didn't even flinch and twisted the steering wheel and we went back toward the island.
The volcano looked like it was erupting but no lava spilled from the top. The "lava" was a combination of clever lighting and smoke but even so, it looked cool. John drove us past models of huge blue and green birds with moving beaks and recorded chirping. After we rounded the island, the boat came to a stop. We stepped back onto the pavement, and I was impressed with my cousin's captain-ship.
The thing about Magic Paradise was, I probably knew these things couldn't exist together in the same place. The carnival was ordinary enough, but I knew there couldn't be snow-covered sleighs in the middle of summer. I didn't think NASA could actually launch a spaceship from the park, and I was pretty sure humans couldn't make it to Pluto in a real spaceship. And of course, I knew dinosaurs were extinct.
But for that afternoon, I could believe in all of these things, all at the same time. I didn't have to worry about what was real or not because we were in Magic Paradise.
The summers in between high school, I worked at Magic Paradise and I could see how the park's reality-bending delighted children. The magic didn't work for me anymore, but sometimes I wish it would. Some days I wish there was a Magic Paradise for adults to visit and forget about what did and did not fit into reality. Sometimes a complete suspension of belief was exactly what I needed.
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