Back in 1979, when I was eight years old, my cousins and I piled into my aunt’s station wagon with a cooler full of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and a half-dozen flavors of Faygo. It wasn’t our first trip to Kings Island, also known as the largest amusement park in the Midwest, but it was the first time we were going to ride THE BEAST–the longest, and arguably to this day, one of the best wooden roller coasters in the world.

I remember the anticipation lasting for the entire drive and during our ride on the “warm-up” coaster called The Racer. By the time we were finally in line for The Beast, our excitement was almost unbearable. We were terrified, we were giddy, our emotions were up and down like…well, like a roller coaster. The mood of everyone in line was positively electric.

And, that ride lived up to every bit of our expectations.

For over four minutes, we were sent screeching along the wooden track, hurled into the woods, thrown around deep banks and into underground tunnels. The fact that we were moving at a speed of 65 miles per hour on the track you see in this picture, made the ride all the more exciting. That’s not steel, folks.

It was a thrill-ride like no other. And, thirty-three years later, it still is.

Now, I take my own kids to Kings Island and this year my son was finally tall enough to ride some of the bigger coasters, including The Beast. Kings Island has an amazing area for young kids (and I’m not just saying that; Camp Snoopy has been rated the “Best Kids Area in the World” for 11 consecutive years by Amusement Today), but my son is ten years old and has been mentally preparing to move on to the big rides for at least three years.

But that didn’t mean there wasn’t fear in the air when he finally got in line for The Beast.

Don’t let him fool you. He loved it.

Not only did my little 48-incher ride The Beast, but also Vortex, which contains two vertical loops, one corkscrew, one boomerang turn, and a 360-degree helix. He rode that one three times. We were extra grateful for the wristband which identified that he had been measured at Guest Services, so we didn’t have to wait for them to check his height on every ride.

Then there was Drop Tower .

That’s my daughter sitting in unlucky seat #13 and our friends, on either side, who were brave enough to ride 315 feet up, only to be dropped down the tower at 67 miles per hour. I took pictures. With my feet on the ground

Fortunately, Kings Island has a rating system in place to help any visitor choose their park adventure, grading rides on a scale from Low Thrills (1) to Aggressive Thrills (5), so if you think that rides like Drop Tower (5) seem too adventurous, you can ride Scrambler (3) or take a trip to the top of the Eiffel Tower (2).

I love that Kings Island has been bringing me decade upon decade of fun and laughter. I love that my kids can experience and appreciate the same things I did when I was their age. I love that despite the generational gap, my teenage daughter and I both speak the same language when we’re on a roller coaster. But mostly, I just love The Beast.

And, I’m pretty sure I always will.

Are you a Aggressive Thrills rider or a Aggressive Thrills photographer when you go to amusement parks?

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When I was in the fourth grade I painted a picture of a young soldier. He wore a red coat, white pants and a black hat. Apparently, when you’re nine years old and there hasn’t been a war in your lifetime, you take style inspiration from the Revolutionary War.

The painting was good. Was I a child prodigy? No. Did my mom think I was? Yes. Every person who came over for bridge club for the next two months had to see the painting. She was proud. I understand this now because of my daughter’s second grade gourd painting. Yes, gourd. I had it custom-framed and it hangs in our living room. Shut up.

Beyond the fourth grade, I lost my artistic mojo. Sure, there was the pencil sketch of a lion in the seventh grade and the envelopes I designed in order to get pre-sale concert tickets while in college, but it didn’t go beyond that.

Until I discovered Draw Something.

This little iPhone game is making my artistic mojo creep back. I have done a good job of drawing kung fu, spaghetti and crutches. I’ve sketched Barney, gardens and an orchestra. The little soldier in the red coat must be buried in there somewhere, too!

As NOT evidenced by my son guessing this, which I drew:

Him: Stares in disbelief. Looks at me, looks back at the phone. Says, “Mom, I have no idea what this is. I think the thing at the top of the picture is a gray banana, though.” In fairness to him, gray bananas aren’t an uncommon sighting in our fruit basket.

Me: “Let me give you a hint. The thing with the red handle is a tool.”

Him: “Oh! It’s a screwdriver stabbing a gray banana!”

I will not, in fact, be quitting my day job.

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I was going to write a post tonight about how my mom told my 10 year old son that she has a lot of bumps and bruises and he asked, “Why?”

She said, “Because I’m a klutz.”

Then he said, “Oh, I thought it was because you’re old … and a klutz.”

But, when I logged in to start writing, I noted the date. I started blogging here on June 26, 2007. It’s my five-year blogoversary!

A lot has changed since then. A whole lot. Mostly, that my husband thought blogging was a huge waste of time and now HE’S ALL FOR IT. Of all the things I’ve been right about, I’m glad it was blogging. Okay, it’s the only thing I’ve been right about, but I should get extra credit for it!

I have told countless stories like the one up there, because OHBOY does my son like to hurl insults. Of course, now that he’s ten instead of five, I feel like I need to tell people it’s because of his sub-threshold autism, and not just because he’s rotten. Though, he is that too. He’s still about the same size as he was five years ago, but not much else has changed.

My daughter has gone from eight to thirteen. That’s, like, a whole lifetime. *eye roll* She’ll be going to college in five years. SHUT UP! Don’t say that! Oh, I said that? Well, take note people, THAT’S how fast it goes. Blink and your kids are grown. Also, when you’re 41 years old instead of 36, you blink and you sprout a gray chin hair.

More than anything I want to say thank you to the most amazing, fabulous, delightful, kind, funny, faithful readers and commenters in the blogosphere. You are good people.

If I’m really lucky, you’ll still be around when I’m old and klutzy.

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It all started when I walked into my daughter’s room after midnight, on a school night, and found her looking out of her window. Our conversation went something like this:

“What the heck are you doing?”

“Sorry, Mom! I can’t sleep, so I’m taking pictures of the lightning.”

“GO TO SLEEP! You can’t get any good pictures THROUGH YOUR WINDOW SCREEN!”

I was wrong.

The next day, when she showed me the images she captured, I saw that she had taken this a few days prior.

I have a DSLR and don’t take pictures that well. I mean, you want your kids to be good at stuff, but they’re not supposed to be better than you. She’s showing me up with a point and shoot!

This sealed the deal on me needing to take a photo class. I have long said that I would love to have two other blogs….hold on, while I use these smelling salts on my husband…one for design and one for food, but my pictures aren’t even close to where they would need to be for those kind of websites.

But, my daughter is showing me that maybe I should forget the bells and whistles and just take the picture already. Using a point and shoot isn’t stopping her from capturing some great moments.

Proof? When I went to pull these two photos off her flash drive, I found this picture of Blue that my daughter took the day before we put her down.

Oh, forget it. I can’t compete with that.

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