We went to Great Wolf Lodge for Noe's birthday and the kids had a blast!The last time we were there,Noe was not yet four and we insisted he stay in the kiddie pool all the time.This time it was different-he never ventured into the kiddie pool and he wanted to ride the 'lose you lunch' slides the WHOLE time!!
I did a couple of them(once each) and got off with this sick feeling in my stomach and an ache in my head and the need to climb on my mom's lap and stay there-it was scary!And then I find out that those were the tamer slides and not what Noe wanted to do-he wanted to do something called 'Howling Tornado' -and get this,he wanted to go alone!
Our first evening there,I stayed perched on a lounge chair reading a book while dad and kids were off in the water-that gave me a chance to people watch-and it was amusing and thought-provoking at the same time.
I sat close to the wave pool and watched humanity in action-the wave pool comes on every five minutes(I timed it,I must confess,an idle mind.......) and I noticed that different people reacted differently to the oncoming wall of water.
Parents with young kids either started walking away from the water,or held on to their kids and let them feel the rush of water on their tiny bodies-and the kids reaction varied too-some gurgled in delight,while some screamed in terror.The slightly older bunch of kids had life vests on and therefore ventured deeper into the pool-again some timidly and the others jauntily pushing the hovering adults away,with a 'bring it on' attitude.
Anyone above maybe 10 years of age, went crazy-most of them lunged at the waves and tried to get the better of it-the seasoned swimmers pretended to ride the waves and some of them-like a 12 year old I know,managed to scrape their bellies on the concrete floor when the wave managed to win over them and push them ashore.
And of course the adults!Anyone over 25 or looked over 25 remained calm and composed and nonchalantly let the waves ride over them and seemed to instinctively know how to not let the wave win.
There were always outliers in the pool,the occasional teenager who couldn't face the water rushing at him,the father dragging a toddler screaming and kicking away from the water when the kid wanted to go toward it.I even saw a tattooed dad(I think tattoos mean you are fearless,because I have heard they are painful to get and if you get a body full of them,you must be absolutely fearless!) try to push his unwilling kid farther in that he would have liked to be.
And the body types-oh!A swim suit is not flattering on certain body types(I can personally vouch for that!!),and the crowd was mixed as usual in the handling of swimsuits.There were the extremely fit women in two piece suits which made me go,"Dang!I wish I could pull that look off!!",and the curvy ladies who rocked in their swimwear,and of course the very conscious fairer sex who hid more than they displayed(I even saw a muslim lady in purdah who obviously did not venture near the water,but mostly babysat her small son,while dad shepherded the two older kids through the slides),and finally the'I don't care what you think of me, but this is what I am wearing ' womenfolk.Men differed-the speedos were a little-pun intended-offensive ,but they generally wore swim trunks that were,er,swim trunks-that was about it.So both the sexes were true to form at the wave pool.
I came to the conclusion that life was indeed like a wave pool-moments of calm interspersed with moments of confusion and unease.Utterly unpredictable,unlike the timed certainty of the wave pool but identical nonetheless.And how we handle it did not vary much either-run away from the problem,face it head on,go with the flow......I saw it all.
The entire life cycle of Homo Sapiens played out in front of me.Parents guiding the youngsters through life in its cyclical nature.Isn't a baby's efforts to roll over almost like a wave coming at her?Some parents help the kid by physically aiding them,others urge them on with encouragement,and yet others let time do the work.Older kids want to face challenges by themsleves-and how they face it was also on display at the pool.And the insouciance of the adults-the 'I've seen it all' attitude-I saw that too.
There was also an escape from the mundane-a bucket tip of a 1000 gallons of water which was again timed to around 5 minute intervals and happened exactly in the middle of the calm and the storm of the wave pool-so if you are too bored or too overwhelmed with the pool,there was your escape!
So it was that I found out that you can sit on a lounge chair at a water park in Grand Mound,WA and attain Nirvana without having to move to Washington state for the other obvious reason which I am told,helps speed up the process immensely!!
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