Log Ride

I sorta feel like I should clarify yesterday's ramblings. I love my life and don't want anyone else's. I think what I was (and am?) envying is just those times in life when you can just be really excited about something. Things are going well for me, but there isn't anything big or exciting happening right now (birthday week doesn't count and Vegas 2005 is MONTHS away). Like when you have an awesome crush or something amazing happens in your career or you find out you're going to have a baby or move someplace wonderful and exotic. Just those incredible moments where you feel so excited and happy and goofy that you can't stand it. Whether they're small day long ones or month long ones. They're just awesome. And I want one. Maybe I'll have to go find a great job or get a big crush or fall in love or something. Though I guess those moments are best when they aren't forced, huh?

I was thinking about a goofy junior high one of mine yesterday. I think it was 7th or 8th grade. There was this guy I was totally crushing on and had been for a while. I have no idea why. He wasn't all that spectacular. In fact, when I first met him I thought he looked kinda like a non-blue smurf. But he was a really nice guy. And one of the adored popular boys. And really funny too. And he would not swear at all and said things like Dagnabit which I thought was so cute. And I was like 13 so whatever. I was just totally IN LOVE in a 13 year old way.

It was the end of the school year and so it was Rusheon Jr High night at Hamel's Park, the small amusement park in our town. So my girlfriends and I went. And he was there with his buddies. And I was all giddy at seeing him. And my girlfriends knew I was crushing on him so we all just acted like idiots trying to follow his posse around and trying to figure out how to get him to ride on the train with me that circles the park - where the kids go to make out. And it was so awesome. At one point we were gathered at the log ride with a few from each posse planning to ride. I hated log rides but was going to go for it. Only problem is there were 7 of us and only 6 fit in each log. So I was going to bow out. Then one guy said he'd ride alone and gave me his seat. Right in front of Matt. Y'all! I was so excited I think I almost peed. It was in the back half of the car so I was behind the hot Derek (who I crushed on at a later date and I'm not 100% that his name was Derek) and in front of Matt. Who put his hands around my waist and rested his chin on my shoulder. Bliss! I was on a high for the rest of the week I think.

After the log ride he turned to me and asked if I wanted to ride the roller coaster. I HATE roller coasters. They scare me to pieces. I was 25 years old and on my 5th Walt Disney World visit before I finally worked up the courage to ride Space Mountain. And that is not even a major coaster. I'm a little better about them now - being almost 30 - but I was a wuss at 12 or 13. About coasters at least. So my friends all snickered when he asked because they KNOW I'm not going on that coaster. But they were mistaken about the extreme power of CUTE BOY over me. I said yes before I knew what I was doing. I think I spent the whole ride with my eyes closed and grasping onto Matt for dear life (not such a bad thing).

And that was it. Nothing ever happened with Matt and I. But that didn't really seem to matter. It was just so awesome an event in my little world on it's own and the possibilities it opened up in my mind. I was so excited and peppy and insane. I went home that night and described the whole thing in detail in my diary. And then I drew a diagram of the log and who was sitting where. A diagram.

It makes me a little giddy still, a million years later, thinking about it. Hee. So cute.

Dammit, I just read that Hamel's park closed in 1999. I am very sad. What's happened to Shreveport? No Hamel's, no Captain's baseball team... I don't know how much more I can take. And now I'm feeling all nostalgic for Bossier City and Shreveport, LA. I should get back there sometime soon.