Margaret Mead Meets Esther Williams

Before I start in earnest with this posting let me first say that if any of you are asking, "Who are Margaret Mead and Esther Williams?" You deserve to be punished. More so if you don't know who Esther Williams was. I think I can forgive not knowing who Margaret Mead was. Though just barely.

Yesterday was a non-park day.

I know, you're sitting there wondering how we could be so close to the "magic" and not hurl ourselves at the nearest theme park. Well, we did go to a theme park of sorts, Typhoon Lagoon, a water park.

It must be odd to think of me in a water park, but from time to time I do like to get down and boogie or shall I say bobble with the people.

Now I don't like the beach. Actually I hate the beach and I don't care much for the ocean, seeing as it is so often located next to a beach. It's the sand I hate. Can't stand it. I blame my sister, for it is because of her that I hate the beach so much.

It all started when I was about three or four years old. We lived about four blocks from the ocean in Brighton Beach the next door neighbor to Coney Island in Brooklyn. My sister, who is twelve years older than I, took me to the beach one day. I frolicked in the sand and got sand in my bathing suit. My sister made me walk the four blocks home. The sand was really irritating me and rubbing me raw, but no matter how much I cried, or just plain sat down on the ground, she made me walk. It turned into a death march for me, hot and painful, the first of what was to become a long line of death marches in my life.

I've never forgiven my sister for it. Sometimes I call her up just to shout into the phone, "You spoiled ocean resorts for me forever!" And then slam down the receiver. As a matter of fact, I'll be happy to share her address with you, should you wish to send her hate mail.

Don't get me wrong, while I detest the beach, I love the water. I like nothing better than wide expanses of sand-free concrete and water. So, Typhoon Lagoon suits me entirely. Well, almost, because they do spoil the pristine concrete with patches of sand, but for the most part I can avoid those.

I feel like such a man of the people when I'm at Typhoon Lagoon, chatting with people while I wait in queue to go down a water slide. You meet interesting people from backgrounds that are very different to oneself. I also find that swim suits are a great leveler. Plus bobbing in a giant wave pool with scores of other people is almost quite literally swimming in a sea of humanity.

Another fact that I'll share with you is that I can't sit still for very long. I get easily bored. Other people may relax lying on a lounge chair in the sun, but I get very bored. So, sliding down water slides, and water coasters suits me completely. I like being wet, but I also like being active.

I remember once, back in the early 80's going for a session in one of those isolation tanks that was so fashionable back then. The younger of you may not know about them. They were large oversized water filled chambers, or waterlogged caskets if you will, filled with water that was turned into a super saturated solution of salt water, which increase buoyancy. The water was kept at a temperature of 98.6 so it was body temperature. You climbed in the chamber and the lid was shut so it was completely dark. So here you were, floating in a body temperature solution in the dark. It was called sensory depravation, and was supposed to be relaxing, because in theory is was like returning to the womb.

When I tried it, I didn't relax, I got bored. That is until, I discovered that because of the solution I could bounce easily around the little chamber, zipping up and down and back and forth. I found this bouncing around amusing and something to do to pass the time. Then while bouncing around I remembered that my mother had told me that I was particularly active while in the womb and never stopped moving and kicking. So there I was, I had really come full circle and returned to the womb, though without the messy bits.