We're almost over the top!
I've got the family in the roller coaster car with me and we're still on the steep-up part of that initial big hill, the chain pulling us up, clack, clack, clack, clack. It's dark but I think I can feel the car tilting downward, tilting forward as we're reaching the crest...
My first big roller coaster was Space Mountain – tame by today’s standards, but it does have a fairly unique attribute: you really can't see the tracks, either from the queue or from the ride itself.
You don't really have an idea of when the big drops show up, what the turns are or even which direction. You know the overall parameters - you know what a roller coaster is - and you know it's impossible not to have fun and not wind up completely safe at the end of it. You know what’s coming but you can’t really prepare for it.
You got in line because you know it will be a fun experience. It will be a thrill. If you're new to the whole thing, it may be the most intense thrill yet.
The line was an hour long, mostly boring, but it built the anticipation. We’re definitely tilting forward now, moving free of the chain…
I know in an instant my stomach will rocket to my mouth and I’ll be clutching the handles on unseen turns and dips and maybe a “negative G rollover”. I'll scream, I'll laugh, I'll whoop! Right now I don't know the details. But I'm terribly excited and I’m ready!
And, no, roller coasters don’t ever make me sob.
These coming tears are the appropriate release for this specific moment of intensity. I welcome them.
For this flavor of "grief" is NOT the terrible, final, one-way grief. We are all alive and in these moments as alive as we ever are. And we will share these moments right now forever.
Wheeeee!