Remember those ‘Good Old Days of Summer’? Enjoying the hot, lazy afternoons swimming at Memorial Park, riding bike around town, that neighborhood pick-up game of baseball over in the empty lot, and the once in the summer trip to the Midway at the county fair.
Today kids fill the hot, lazy days of summer with trips to the indoor pool at the KCC, organized baseball through Community Ed., playing video games in the air conditioned family room and still the ever popular trip to the Midway.
The Midway of today is not at the county fair. Of course, there are carnivals at the county fair, but today’s kids prefer a trip to a theme park instead.
This past Monday I had an opportunity to travel to Valleyfair - Minnesota’s own theme park. I helped chaperone a group of 70 youth from four churches in three towns who were bused to the Twin Cities to participate in a volunteer project at Feed My Starving Children and then on to Valleyfair.
At Feed My Starving Children, it was heart- warming to see the youth ready, willing and able to help package food for starving children throughout the world. The organizers shared a DVD showing children who received the food and the difference it made in their lives.
Did you know that 13,000 children die of hunger every day?
It was heart-warming to watch our kids fill, seal and box the food. In a little over an hour they had bagged over 47,000 meals to feed hungry children.
Then it was on to Valleyfair.
I caught up with a group of kids after hours and hours at Valleyfair. It was then that I had the ‘ah-ha’ moment.
“That was the best ride yet,” screamed a teenage girl. “After riding roller coaster after roller coaster, that was the scariest ride of all! I’m going again!” I looked behind her at the ride she was talking about. It was the Tilter - we used to call them the Tilt-a-Whirl.
She was amazed how the only safety device was a loose fitting lap bar and that just as soon as she thought that the ride was slowing down, suddenly “it just went round and round and round really fast.”
I thought about the Midway that I loved at the Red River Valley Fair. I too loved the Tilt-a-Whirl and enjoyed riding the Octopus, the Mad Mouse and the Scrambler. Sure enough, the names might have changed, but those familiar rides are an integral part of the fun at Valleyfair.
A vivid memory from my Midway days was the time that a kid threw up, “right there in the dirt” after getting off a ride. Sure enough, a vivid memory from Monday was the story of the kid who got off the Xtreme Swing and threw up, “right there - gross!”
Of course, no trip to the Midway is complete without a ride on the Merry-Go-Round. As I sat and watched, child after child was smiling and waving as they went round and round, up and down, on that gallant black stallion.
The ‘Good Old Days of Summer’ are the same and it appears that even though baseball games have become organized, their is still magic in the music of the Carousel.
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Remember those ‘Good Old Days of Summer’? Enjoying the hot, lazy afternoons swimming at Memorial Park, riding bike around town, that neighborhood pick-up game of baseball over in the empty lot, and the once in the summer trip to the Midway at the county fair.
Today kids fill the hot, lazy days of summer with trips to the indoor pool at the KCC, organized baseball through Community Ed., playing video games in the air conditioned family room and still the ever popular trip to the Midway.
The Midway of today is not at the county fair. Of course, there are carnivals at the county fair, but today’s kids prefer a trip to a theme park instead.
This past Monday I had an opportunity to travel to Valleyfair - Minnesota’s own theme park. I helped chaperone a group of 70 youth from four churches in three towns who were bused to the Twin Cities to participate in a volunteer project at Feed My Starving Children and then on to Valleyfair.
At Feed My Starving Children, it was heart- warming to see the youth ready, willing and able to help package food for starving children throughout the world. The organizers shared a DVD showing children who received the food and the difference it made in their lives.
Did you know that 13,000 children die of hunger every day?
It was heart-warming to watch our kids fill, seal and box the food. In a little over an hour they had bagged over 47,000 meals to feed hungry children.
Then it was on to Valleyfair.
I caught up with a group of kids after hours and hours at Valleyfair. It was then that I had the ‘ah-ha’ moment.
“That was the best ride yet,” screamed a teenage girl. “After riding roller coaster after roller coaster, that was the scariest ride of all! I’m going again!” I looked behind her at the ride she was talking about. It was the Tilter - we used to call them the Tilt-a-Whirl.
She was amazed how the only safety device was a loose fitting lap bar and that just as soon as she thought that the ride was slowing down, suddenly “it just went round and round and round really fast.”
I thought about the Midway that I loved at the Red River Valley Fair. I too loved the Tilt-a-Whirl and enjoyed riding the Octopus, the Mad Mouse and the Scrambler. Sure enough, the names might have changed, but those familiar rides are an integral part of the fun at Valleyfair.
A vivid memory from my Midway days was the time that a kid threw up, “right there in the dirt” after getting off a ride. Sure enough, a vivid memory from Monday was the story of the kid who got off the Xtreme Swing and threw up, “right there - gross!”
Of course, no trip to the Midway is complete without a ride on the Merry-Go-Round. As I sat and watched, child after child was smiling and waving as they went round and round, up and down, on that gallant black stallion.
The ‘Good Old Days of Summer’ are the same and it appears that even though baseball games have become organized, their is still magic in the music of the Carousel.
