LAKESIDE AMUSEMENT PARK
The
Fun House -- an iconic attraction mentioned most by old-school
Lakeside visitors -- that was located where the Dragon now sits was
one of the most visually notable parts of the park. A giant, animated
papier-mâché puppet woman known as "Laffing
Sal" greeted
riders there with her hysterical cackle; word is she may still be in
storage somewhere in the park.
*
No,
this is not about Donald Trump.
But
Because of Donald J. Trump our fate (and the world's) is inside the
toilet.
Not
on the seat.
*
TALE
OF THE TUB
I
had finished my shower on August 10, 2010.
It
was mid-morning.
I
should have had a Tarot reading before my shower.
I
should have had someone do my bio-rhythm (I don't have the faintest
idea what a bio-rhythm is. I just remember it from the seventies
when it was being read.)
In
fact, I did have mine read after I had had an accident in my Datsun
truck, driving down Boulder Canyon.
I
flipped the truck on a nasty curve.
I
believe it was March 7 or 10, 1971.
Laura
(Laura then, but later Madhavi---not the Indian actress.) read my
bio-rhythm after my accident.
She
told me that my bio-rhythm was very low that day.
She
told me it wasn't a good day to be driving.
Later,
I asked her what her name meant.
She
said it meant divine light.
*
I
should have done many things.
I
didn't know, nor did I think about what my fate would be that
morning.
Who
ever does?
Well,
maybe some of us do.
*
Nobody
else was home.
And
I was soon to become the person in the television commercial who says
“I've fallen down and I can't get up.”
Except
in my case it was“I've fallen down in the bathtub, and I can't
get up.”
*
Actually,
I had fallen into the tub.
I
should let readers imagine how that happened.
Think
about how I could have fallen into my bathtub.
Let
your minds wander.
I'd
love to hear your answers, instead of the mundane answer I'm about to
give.
*
As
I said, I had finished my shower.
And
then...came that
twist
of fate.
But
first:
Centrifugal
force is ubiquitous in our daily lives. We experience it when we
round a corner in a car or when an airplane banks into a turn. We see
it in the spin cycle of a washing machine or when children ride on a
merry-go-round. One day it may even provide artificial gravity for
space ships...
I
guess this particular twist involved both centrifugal and centripetal
forces.
If
so, both did a good job, and should be congratulated.
Some
day I may experience artificial gravity, but this time it didn't
occur.
It
was these two forces and gravity that brought me down.
*
There
used to be a large disc in the funhouse at Lakeside Amusement Park in
Colorado.
It
rotated very fast.
The
spinning began slowly, then gradually increased.
Humans
who sat on the large disc were wont to get thrown off, and especially
those who had been standing.
You
held onto the wooden pancake for dear life, but eventually you were
tossed off, and the friction usually rubbed off a considerable amount
of epidermis.
*
My
TWIST OF FATE was not so fun, but its velocity was on the same
footing as the spinning disc.
Mine
had an oval disc:
the
toilet seat.
The
holy seat did not spin until I put one of my feet on it to dry
my toes.
The
seat twisted, and w h o o s h!
I
fell backwards into the bathtub.
I
grabbed the rack behind the toilet, but it didn't stop my falling.
On
my way into the bathtub I grabbed the shower curtains, and they came
down with me as I jackknifed into the tub.
To
be continued...
IT'S
ABOUT RENEWABLE RESOURCES AND FATE