Happy post-Independence Day...
The best fireworks display in South-central Virginia is at Busch Gardens Theme Park in Williamsburg and this would be the third year in a row that I've attended the event. My sister messaged me last night saying that her girls were looking forward to traising about the park with me, since I'm more fun than their un-maneuverable mother with her weight induced health problems, that's not to say that I don't have problems of my own - heat exhaustion, low testosterone, and pre-occupations that make me anxious or angry - but at least I have wit and a talent for the delivery of humour that my sister has had squeezed out of her over years of child-rearing.
Oh, please, if I ever lose my ability to crack a joke, someone strangle me with the notochord of a Gippsland earthworm - 2cm in diameter, 3m in length, another native of my future continent of residency.
Anyhow, when I awoke on 4 July my sister called almost immediately to ask when I was leaving for the park and I replied "I'll text you when I leave." Notice that word "text" because it becomes important later.
I skipped breakfast, skipped buying a soda, and bought petrol for the trip. I was expecting horrendously snarled beach traffic, but there was none. Not once did the traffic slow to a crawl. I exited at my usual stop and stopped at the 7-11 for a 52 oz Mt. Dew, loaded with sugar and caffeine, and 1/4 pound Bite Bite hot dog. which I doused liberally with onins, mustard, cheese, chili, and pickled hot peppers. Not a bad meal for $3.00? I paid in change.
Back in the car I sent a text to my sister, ~Am approaching the park. I'll be there in 20 minutes.~ I received no reply, which is not unusual. People almost never reply to my texts - I'm looking at you Gryphy LOL - and thus I cannot take the absence of reply as a reply of absence.
I arrived at the park and set off for Apollo's Chariot. I have no idea why I chose the hilly purple roller coaster as a first ride, but I did. I was situated behind three teenage girls, who tried to hog the seating, but I would have none of it. I'm all about efficiency when it comes to park amusements - no car should go out half full and this one did not.
From there I quickly boarded the park encircling train and took my leave to New France to ride the blue and grey Griffon - a coaster infamous for a heart-wrenching 89°, 9 story drop, which is delivered by hanging the cars over the precipice before release. The single rider line was open and I was immediately seated. I couldn't ask for a better stroke of luck and it was the first of many. I took the sky tram to Germany and since Dark Kastle's line was crowded, made my way back to Switzerland, where I had an experience on white Alpenghiest similar to my ride on the Griffon - despite the crowded holiday park I had only a short wait for the front car - and was soon zooming through a set of pinion turns with my feet hanging free. I backtracked and took the sky tram to Scotland where I rode the rarely crowded, yellow and weathered Loch Ness Monster - the oldest double looping coaster in the park - its only 7 years younger than me and there's something very biblical about dating oneself in comparison to the coasters and not the riders - most appeared to be no older than 10.
Okay, so I finished all the coasters - I always skip the Big Bad Wolf, because it is neither Big, nor Bad, nor particularly Wolf themed - and still had 7.5 hours remaining until the Fourth of July fireworks. My sister still hadn't responded to the text, so I texted her again while I walked down to Ireland and Corkscrew Hill. Corkscrew Hill broke down while I was on it, but even that was a stroke of luck. The repairs extended my stay in Ireland just long enough that I was there for the Irish step show. I must admit that though the shoe was excellently lit, the mood very thematically correct, the little mini-river dance presentation paled to dancing with LD on the dias the previous week.
I texted my sister again and still there was no response.
For the next four hours I bounced around from amusement to amusement, show to show, always texting my sister after each one. Surely she would respond at some point. I tried calling, but there was no answer. I even walked back to my car where reception was better and both called and texted her and her husband. No answers. No responses. Not even a voice mail pickup.
I was given a Quick Queue coupon by a young woman who was leaving the park early. After the fireworks display I used that coupon to ride the Griffon five times in thirty minutes by virtue of going to the front of the line each time. Rewind a bit though to those fireworks, for though they were not sequential time wise, they make a better ending.
I staked my spot to watch the fireworks almost an hour early and I guarded it zealously. As the music played and sparks showered from the sky, I realized that life doesn't get much better than this. I realized that next Fourth, barring a miracle of finance that brings me home, there will be no fireworks for me. The next display that I see will be from the shoreline of a cove on Sydney harbor on New Years Eve. I'll likely have a warm and hopefully pregnant Bunni under my arm, and those fireworks, so far from my home will mean nothing.
Just possibly the life growing in her belly will. Maybe...
I am nevertheless content. Soon I will be gone from this space and into another.
Qvacks.
Post-Mortem: My sister, for some unknown reason, thought I would call her on her landline and since I did not, she kept her family at home. Her mobile phone had dutifully recorded 15 texts from me from its position on the desk in her bedroom.
optimistic
confused
anxious