Amusement Parks

Amusement Parks

When I first learned that the topic for our writing project this week was amusement parks, I balked.  What can I say about an amusement park that hasn’t already been said?  You love them or you hate them.  I am in the former camp-I love amusement parks, always have.  I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio and have never lived more than an hour’s drive tops away from Kings Island, one of the best amusement parks in the region. 

When the park first opened in the seventies, my mom took us to Kings Island.  At the time I didn’t fully appreciate the sacrifice that was for her financially and how “not fun” it probably was for her to schlep three kids under the age of ten around an amusement park in ninety degree eighty five or so percent humidity weather for twelve hours.  My mom told me years later when I had kids of my own to take to Kings Island that it was all worth it to her when  drug ourselves back to our Pinto station wagon after the 10 pm fireworks display that still concludes every day at the park when I exclaimed, “Thanks, Mom!  This was the happiest day of my life!”  And at the time, it really was. 

When I got older I was able to purchase a Kings Island pass and go dozens of time every summer.  The biggest draw for me was and still is the roller coasters.  Not to be crass, but for me riding a roller coaster is almost as much fun as sex, and in some ways the thrill when the coaster first drops is pretty similar to an orgasm.  I went to Kings Island and rode every coaster they had every summer for many years until the mid- nineties. 

And then something happened that kept me away from Kings Island for nearly twenty years.  I started going bald.  I wasn’t sick.  I learned eventually that I had female pattern baldness and that there wasn’t a whole hell of a lot that could be done for it, but God knows I tried just about every crazy snake oil cure out there.  The best I could do at the time when my hair first started thinning on top was to try to conceal it.  I did this by using a spray on my scalp that matched my hair color.  I was basically spray painting my scalp every day with this stuff to minimize my pale white scalp showing through my ever thinning reddish brown hair.  So what does any of this have to do with Kings Island?  Well the scalp spray was supposed to be waterproof and sweat proof, but it wasn’t.  I had to avoid being in the heat or being anywhere that I might start to sweat too much, because if I wasn’t careful the spray would start running down my face.  It kind of looked like dark red blood. 

Even when my hair loss got progressively worse over the years I still allowed it to keep me from doing things I loved.  I began to wear partial hairpieces which I had glued to the top of my scalp, but even that kept me away from heat-related activities because the glue would liquefy in the heat and would run down into my eyes. 

By 2015 I had become totally bald on the top of my head and I “graduated” to full wigs.  I also got fed up with trying to hide my hair loss and decided it was time to come out.  I posted about it on social media.  I had professional pictures taken of me sans wig and posted those for the world to see.  I made a speech about my hair loss in front of a couple hundred people and I removed my wig at the climax for dramatic effect.  I got a standing ovation.  The speech to this day is available to view on YouTube.  I never shy away from an opportunity now to share about my hair loss, because, as I said in my speech, “We’re all bald in one way or another.”  I never know who it might help.  And I’ve gotten to the age and place in my life where I truly don’t give a shit what people think.  What a place of freedom that is. 

In the process of reclaiming my life now that I no longer felt the need to hide my hair loss at all costs I resumed activities that I thought I would never enjoy again.  I went swimming, biking in the hot sun, and used a sauna.  In 2017 I bought a Kings Island pass and for the first time in so many years I rode all the coasters in the place.  They were even better than I had remembered.  I wore one of my wigs to the park, mainly because I didn't want my head to get sunburned.  I had no issue with my wigs coming loose.  They are high quality and stay put even in high wind situations. 

I remember saying to myself after my first coaster ride in about 20 years, “Wow I think this was one of the happiest days of my life.”  I only wish I hadn’t waited so long.