If you live anywhere near one, chances are you’ll have to take the kids to an amusement park this summer.
I don’t have a real problem with them, other than the mind-numbing lines, the overpriced food, the screaming kids…oh and the entrance fee could fund a third world country for a decade.
Despite all of these cons, I take my daughter every year. I think I’m trying to recapture a moment I’ll never forget from a time I’ll never get back.
When my daughter was almost three, I took her to the amusement park for the first time. The first ride in the kiddy section was a circle of bumblebees that flew round and round, slowly moving up and down.
I admit, I was more than a little overprotective when my daughter was young. Well, to be more accurate, I was obsessed with protecting her against any harm, real or imagined, in any situation.
By this I mean that I charted every morsel that entered her mouth; I made all family members who wanted to baby-sit sign a six-paged contract detailing the rules of her care; and I snuck into her room every night and stuck my finger under her nose to check that she was still breathing. I won’t even get into the sterilization practices and the panicked hospital visits over mosquito bites.
The bees would have been fine if we could go on them together. But this was a kid-only ride. “I want to go on the beeez!” my daughter cried excitedly.
I blanched. How could I let her go on that alone? What if she fell out? What if she got scared? I inspected the pimpled teenager running the ride. He looked bored and not the least bit qualified to hold my daughter’s life in his hands.
I was about to say no when I looked down at her little face and knew I had to say yes. The movement of the bees was so slow it was barely perceptible and the height restricted riders over three feet. They did get belted in (by the teenager, mind you) and closed up tight.
I led her to the entrance, and helped my daughter onto her bee. In doing so, I began the process of letting go that continues today. I waved and cried as she rode her bee around and around, amazed by her independence and the realization that she was no longer a baby. She was no longer just mine; she was becoming her own. She was growing up and I had to let her.
It might not seem like a big deal but those bees changed me. They prepared me for all of the next big steps to come. Steps that I would not be able to control, like going to school and making friends.
That was the first time I realized that I couldn’t prevent all the hurt she would have in life. She has to figure out how to deal with that on her own and I have to let her. But she will always have her mom waving and cheering as she flies by.
