Titan - FInal Story

            My nose pressed against the window as I looked out at the dark sky and empty pastures. The bus was full of kids. Some managed to sleep through the long ride despite their crowded and bumpy surroundings. I was not so fortunate, and instead sat waiting in anticipation for the day ahead of me; the day of our class field trip to Six Flags.

               High thrill rides were not exactly my cup of tea.  I wasn’t always scared of them and even remember liking them at one point in my childhood. Somewhere along the way, however, I developed a powerful fear of anything that strapped you in and flung you around.  I dreaded going to amusement parks and carnivals.  They seemed almost sadistic to me.  Why would people pay to be dropped, spun, flipped, and flung by huge machines? 

I don’t know what was running through my head that day I signed up for the field trip, though I imagine a combination of peer pressure and pride had something to do with it.  They always do.

On the trip there, I overheard many students express similar feelings of fear and anxiety about rides. This was a big relief for me.   I figured that I could hang out with the other non-adrenaline loving students and still have plenty of fun, or at least avoid having to ride anything too daunting.

The sun rose as we pulled into the Metroplex. It had been a six hour long ride and I was ready as ever to get out of the bus.  When we arrived at Six-Flags, we were informed that we must all make groups of four and stick with our group.  This meant that I had to do everything my group did, including riding rides.

Somehow, most of the other students already knew that we would be forced into groups, and had already planned out groups in the bus.  I frantically started searching for a group that shared my fear of all things high and fast. “Why did no one tell me!”, I thought to myself.

               Soon enough and sure enough, my worst fear came true. I was invited to join a group my friends had formed.  I knew from the bus ride that each of the other boys in the group enjoyed only the most thrilling rides; the exact ones that I hated.

“Austin, come join our group. We’re going to ride every roller coaster here.” one of the boys said as if he were giving a sales pitch.  He obviously didn’t know that I wasn’t in the market for his product.

“Every roller coaster?” I replied with my best poker face. I knew that the smart thing for me to do was to say no, but as a seventh grade boy overly concerned with looking like a pansy in front of my friends, I reluctantly joined. I was out of options.

                When we entered the gates of the park, my group immediately began searching for our first ride.  I tried to find rides that would serve as a happy medium between what the rest of the group loved and what I wasn’t too scared to ride.  I suggested that we ride the “Scrambler” first, a moderately intense ride that spins the rider around like a massive egg beater.  I pointed out that it didn’t have a line.  Truthfully, of course, it was its close proximity to the ground that led to the suggestion.

My idea was quickly shut down by the group. ”Too boring”, one of the guys proclaimed.  They had the idea that they wanted to start the day off big and decided that we should first ride the scariest ride in the park, a rollercoaster by the name of “Titan.”

 If you have ever been to Six Flags Over Texas, then it’s pretty much guaranteed you have seen Titan.  It’s the one that climbs 255 feet into the sky before plummeting its riders seventy degrees all the way to the ground, repeating the process, and then sends them through a series of high-speed spirals and twist. The Titan definitely lives up to its name and for someone scarred of riding anything more exhilarating than a carousel, it meant sure death.

                I tried to pretend like I was excited about the idea, never leading on to my fear. I wanted to fit in with the tough guys.  Besides, I had agreed to join the group and I didn’t want to be the one to hold everyone back.

                Despite being one of the first groups of people in the park, a line had already formed at the Titan by the time we made our way over there.  There were signs throughout the line that told you how long of a wait you had from that point.  We stopped by the fifteen minute sign.  The countdown had begun.

                For the next fifteen minutes, I waited in the highest level of anticipation and nervousness.  My hands shook and my palms sweated.  I developed a substantial urge to go to the bathroom even though I hadn’t had a drink all morning. I was deathly scared. I thought about the stupid things my ego forces upon me.  It was the longest fifteen minutes of my life.  I desperately wanted it to be over, and I never wanted it come.

            As the line inched forward, my friends began to talk about their past experiences with roller coasters.  One of the boys told us that he came to Six Flags every summer and had rode the Titan dozens of times.  Listening to him talk about it, I couldn’t detect a trace of fear on him. The other two boys didn’t seem to be phased at all by the ride either.  “Am I the crazy one for being scared of this enormous machine that would soon whirl us around hundreds of feet in the air?”, I thought.  It appeared so.

                The time finally came for us to board the coaster.  My group took our seats in the far back cart. My stomach dropped into my seat when they pulled the bar over my head and locked me in.  It was too late now to turn back.  I was strapped in, both mentally and mechanically.

            The coaster operator came over the intercom.

 “Ladies and gentlemen, please keep all body parts inside the coaster at all times.  Have fun and enjoy the ride.”

The operator received the thumbs up from the other station operators, and with the press of a button the train set off for its voyage. 

                The train left the station at a slow pace and began lugging up the mountain of steel. It made the classic roller-coaster click-clacking sound as it climbed.  The steep accent made it seem like you were lying on your back rather than sitting down.  Some of the passengers screamed in excitement, while others closed their eyes and gripped anything they could find.  I looked up the hill with a bug-eyed stare.  It was taller than it appeared from a distance. It almost went on forever.

 Forty-five seconds passed and the clacking stopped. We had reached the top. I probably could have seen the ocean from up there, but all I could stare at was the ground directly below me.  The parking lot below was filled with ant sized people getting in and out of their Hot Wheels sized cars.

 The brief silence soon turned into a roar that sounded like a fighter jet.  The noise made my heart race even faster.  The front of the train raced down the hill and catapulted the back end over the peak of the hill.  As I looked down, I noticed that we were going steep enough down that the tracks in front of us disappeared.  I could feel the tremendous power of the steel machine as it rushed towards the ground. I felt the true power of gravity.

The train accelerated faster and faster before eventually reaching an underground tunnel at the bottom of the drop.  We sped through the tunnel in a blink of an eye and began the trip up the second hill.  We travelled upward so fast that we would have been catapulted out of our seat at the top had it not been for our lap restraints.  I pushed myself back into my seat, untrusting of the safety features. My vision soon became blurry and tunnel vision set in.  My head was pinned against the head rest.

After the second drop, all that was left was a series of high speed twist and turns that cause headache inducing G-forces.  I managed to survive them, and stayed conscious while doing so.

The ride soon came to an end and the train crept back into the station.  My heart was still racing, but not because I was scared.  I screamed at the top of my lungs, “WOOOOOHOOOOO!” Somehow, all of my fear had vanished. Maybe it was left behind somewhere after the first drop. Maybe my lap restraint was unable to hold it down over the second hill.  Wherever it went, I was sure it wouldn’t be back.  I was now an official thrill seeker who had just received his first taste of excitement.

As we got out of our seats, I eagerly yelled to my friends, “Let’s go again!” 

The Mountain

It was my second day on the mountain.  I was still a novice at the art of skiing, but was handling myself with some degree of control. For the most part, I stayed on the beginner trails; constantly trying to perfect my stopping, turning, and overall comfort level on the skis. When I fell, which was often, I always got back up quickly.  It was too cold that day to stay down in the snow, and my ego was too big.

I had stayed around the base of the mountain most of the day. It felt safe and somewhat level there. Towards the end of the day, my friend (who was also a beginner skier) had the idea to take the last lift to the summit of the mountain and spend the rest of the day skiing down the mountain.  There 

was some sort of beginner trail that zigzagged all the way down the mountain.  Reluctantly, and quite stupidly, I agreed to the plan and hopped on the lift.

I remember vividly how long of a ride it was to the top. I remember the howling of the wind as it blew past my red ears.  I remember how sore my legs felt from supporting the weight of my dangling skis.  Most of all, I remember the cold.  The temperature dropped 20 degrees during the course of the lift.  Too top it all off, I was completely under-dressed for the situation, wearing only jeans, a light coat, and a pair of sunglasses.

The lift took us to the tip top of the mountain, where the only place to look is down.  After a clumsy departure from the de-loading zone, my friend and I made our way down the long trail.  It was much more difficult than anything I had experienced, and I fell much more often.  After a while, the cold became completely unbearable. My non-ski appropriate outfit had begun to get wet from all of the falling.  Any time I was able to stay in control and gain speed, I was tortured by my wet clothes soaking in all the cold out of the air. My glove-less hands soon fell numb and it became impossible to hang onto my poles. This only added to the difficulty and increased the frequency of my falling.  I was miserable.

            In the end, my motivation to get dry and warm was the only thing that got me down the mountain. I was incredibly relieved when I finally reached the base.  Once the snot icicles thawed, I took a moment to think about my stupid decision to ski down an entire mountain.  Although it was a horrible experience, I would gladly do it again.  You truly learn a lot about yourself when faced with such miserable experiences.

           

King of the Pool

                I always loved the water.  I can’t even remember not being able to swim.  That’s not to say that I came out of the womb swimming, I just learned young.  I think that loving water is something that is in my blood.  All Sharp men love the water.   Another interesting fact about all Sharp men, myself included, is that we are always overly eager to show off any and all of our abilities.  Where we lack in ability we make up with boldness, though some may call it stupidity. 

                These two traits often form a bad combination, as they did on this particular day.  It was a blistering summer day at the public swimming pool.  I was only about eight years old at the time, but was under the supervision of my two grandparents who allowed me plenty of freedom.   I, of course, was instantly drawn to the diving boards.  Too me, the diving boards were the only place of interest at any pool.  The shallow section was a place where girls and old people stayed, and the diving boards were a place for men to show off their diving skills.  When you’re eight, there also exist an unwritten code that creates a continuous competition for who can pull of the coolest and most daring trick.  The winner is crowned king of the pool (at least in his own head). 

                This particular pool had a high dive, which was unfamiliar to me, and it didn’t take long to realize that I would have to master the high dive in order to be crowned, which of course was my only goal.  As a potential king, I couldn’t let the competition know that I was a high dive beginner.  I decided that I should at least start off with a front flip that way they would know that I meant business.  I began to climb the ladder, showing no signs of fear.  When I reached the top, I stood tall and looked down at all of the people.  It felt great.  On top is where I belonged and I was here to prove it.  

                I began to focus.  I mentally ran through the trick; visualizing my takeoff, tuck, and landing.  I reminded myself that I had done this trick countless times on the low dive and that it would be a piece of cake.  If anything, the extra height would only make things easier.  “Nothing to worry about”, I told myself.  With that thought, I took a deep breath and began running toward the edge.  I jumped as high as I could and tucked as tightly as possible.  I saw the world spinning around me.  Shades of blue and green and everything in between blurred past me.  I could sense that something was wrong. I was spinning too much. It wasn’t until I hit the water face-first that I regained my orientation.   The hardness of the water’s surface slapped me back into reality.

  I stayed under water for a while, too ashamed to poke my head above.  Eventually, my lack of gills forced me to make my way to the top.   As I swam to the side of the pool, I noticed the clouds of blood my nose had made in the pool.  I couldn’t feel any pain though, my face was completely numb.  By the time I climbed out of the pool several lifeguards had ran over to me.   They bandaged up my nose and warned me to stay off the diving board.  My embarrassment wouldn’t have let me climb back up there anyway.  

I soon left the pool; crownless, defeated, and a little bloody.   My pride was somewhere in the bottom of the deep end.   My grandparents and anyone else that heard the story probably thought I was crazy.  Little do they know about the true rules of the pool.

A Coming of Age Story From 1953

During my last visit to the periodicals section for library research, I ended up spending almost an hour wondering around each and every aisle trying to make up my mind which magazine I wanted to pick.  When I arrived this time, I looked around for only a few minutes before deciding on The Saturday Evening Post.  I randomly chose a 1953 edition, sat down, and started flipping through the pages.

               

                At first, it felt as though I was never going to find a coming of age story since the magazine was mostly advertisements.  However, I noticed that each edition had a few short stories in the very beginning so I decided to skim over those.  I must have looked through 30 stories before finally settling on a short story titled “The Language of Love”.  I don’t know what it was going through my head at the time that I decided that this particular story related to the coming of age theme.  I guess falling in love seemed like a life changing process usually associated with adolescence, so it would suffice.

"The Language of Love"

                It did not take long before I realized that the story had very little to do with love.  Instead, it was about a fictional middle aged stay-at-home mother named Miriam Ainsworth and her reflections on her life and her children.  The story began with a brief biography of Miriam’s life.  It said that Miriam always knew that she would end up being a stay-at-home mom, despite having a talent in art.  She married at a young age and had four children by the time she turned 30. Miriam sometimes wondered what her life would have been like had she pursued her interest in art or if she had never married and had children.  Her busy life prevented her from having these thoughts often however.

                The story soon shifts to a typical morning in Miriam’s household.  She narrates her thoughts as she observes her four children.  Miriam’s oldest daughter, Linda, is described by Miriam in great detail, and most of the story is Miriam thinking about her.  Linda is described as being the most beautiful of the three children but also the shiest. After a while, Miriam soon shifts her focus to her concern over the fact that Linda is not turning out the way Miriam had hoped.  In particular, Miriam worries that her daughter is too concerned with “looking and acting intellectual”.   Miriam expresses her thoughts to the reader as she watches Linda interact with a flirty neighborhood boy.  The story quickly ends unresolved, almost as if it were just an excerpt from another story.

                I found myself questioning what the author’s intentions were with the piece. What was he trying to convey? While this question remains to be unanswered, I do believe that the story has elements of the coming of age theme.  Miriam, a stay at home mom of 20 years, looks back on her life and wonders what it could have been. She wonders if she has lived up to her potential, or if it has gone to waste. This question Miriam asks herself if a crucial part of maturing, perhaps the last crucial step. Miriam seeks a sense of achievement in her life, and ends up finding it in her children.

The desire of self-fulfillment is something that everyone shares, and we all end up asking ourselves at one point if we are living up to our potential.  Looking back at our life and reflecting on what we have achieved certainly is a kind of coming of age experience and usually results in an overall more mature and self-aware self.