Month: April 2020

Today it was announced that Indiana Beach has been purchased by a new owner that plans to reopen the amusement park.  Several weeks prior it had been announced that the park was going to close after 94 years of operation.  Indiana Beach is getting another chance to go forward.  I received this information as wonderful news.  For ten seasons I worked at Indiana Beach.  The place holds a special place in my heart.  I am grateful that for a while longer that Indiana Beach has life and will remain open.

For ten seasons I worked at Indiana Beach doing every job imaginable in the place.  I was customer service.  I operated amusement rides.  If someone needed to light stunt performers on fire, well I was the guy for that too.  I experienced so much in my summers at the park.  It shaped so much of my mindset and my life.  Eternal gratefulness is the best description of my attitude towards the place and everything I experienced there.

Being 35 years old now I can look back on the past and see different things that have shaped me.  For many people they look at their high school, college, or neighborhood as the place that shaped them.  Those places all shaped me a bit, but Indiana Beach carried so much weight.  I learned about work there.  I learned about community there.  As time moves on, I understand how much I did love working at that place. 

It was an emotional time when I heard that the Indiana Beach was going to be closed.  The news of Indiana Beach closing was like the news of a lost friend.  With all the time I spent there, I left a little part of myself in that place.  I think anytime you spend years of your life in a place, you can end up leaving part of yourself there.  So now I can just be glad this special place is back in business. 

We get special places in our lives.  Indiana Beach is one of those places for me.  I am happy this place is going to continue.  It is such a special place in so many ways.  To list all the ways would take more time than I have tonight.  The place was real, it was make believe, it was a dream, it was hope for those of us that stayed there long enough to get to know the place.  That place is a living breathing thing, it is alive in mysterious ways.  I am grateful that this place that was such a huge part of my story is alive a little longer. 

There was a time when I believed in so many things.  I believed I could do anything.  I believed there was truth to be found in the mouths of political leaders.  I was a young man with the views of a young man.  This has changed, victories and defeats alike have changed me.  I see more of the truth of the world.  I recognize that in many cases there is no benefit to believing in most things.  This could be a catalyst for cynicism and coldness, but it hasn’t become that.  I burn brighter, I feel more warmth than ever before.  As so many of my beliefs fall away, I am grateful for the things I believe in more than ever.

To believe in so many things serves no purpose.  I don’t think it serves any purpose to believe in a politician.  Some believe in athletes or celebrities, I see no point in that.  Others believe in Star Wars, or Netflix, or YouTube, or any number of things.  I view this as misplaced belief, and it serves no purpose in my mind.

Belief is a thing I can place.  I can place my belief in any number of things.  I must choose these places wisely though.  When belief is placed, we create an expectation or a relationship with something.  This is a powerful force not to be taken lightly.  I find it powerful that I can still enjoy or participate in a thing without belief.  When I was younger I had belief and energy put into so many things.  I can’t bring myself to put my belief in many of those things.

The judicious application of belief seems to be on the road to wisdom.  There are so many things that I still believe in.  I believe in these things more than ever.  I have not become the cynic, I have become the fanatic.  I am so immensely grateful that I grow stronger in my beliefs and centered in them as time progresses.  I don’t believe in as many things as before, but I still believe.

I still believe in God.  I believe God has a plan for me.  I believe all the twists and turns and pains of my life have been put before me for a reason.  I cannot say what this plan is, but I believe God has done everything for a reason.  I stay centered in the belief that all of this stuff in my life matters.

Throughout my life family has remained important and central.  With all the love and all the memories, I don’t know how I couldn’t believe in them. 

True friendship is a force so powerful, it begs to be believed in and thus I believe.

I may believe in other things, these are the most powerful though.  I don’t need to believe in much else to make it through this world.  In the darkest of days I am grateful I can rest my faith and belief in this things.  I am grateful I have not lost the faith, and I still believe.

Joe Diffie passed away recently from the coronavirus.  His made a lot of country music for a long time.  I stumbled across his music sometime in my youth.  So much of his music had a fun twist to it.  That seems to fit me well.  I enjoyed the humor to his music.  I am grateful he made so much fun music for us to enjoy. 

Music can speak to so many sides of us.  I can enjoy the darkness of Metallica.  I can enjoy instrumental music.  For me Joe Diffie’s music spoke to my humorous side.  I think it’s wonderful to create some art that just makes people smile.  Making music that makes people smile, well that is a legacy worth having and something we can all aspire to with our own art.

Our society is facing the most trying time we have during my lifetime.  Coronavirus is wreaking havoc.  The United States government is becoming more corrupt and dysfunctional by the moment.  The speed of our technological innovation is sitting there as a potential problem as well.  These are just the perils that come to mind at the moment, we face many more.  Even against these challenges we see the glimmers of hope.  There are good people doing good things to fight against these evil forces.  There better ways of living out there, and we might find them.  It is wonderous how adaptable and imaginative that we can be.  I am grateful for the adaptiveness and imagination of the forces of good.

As societies and individuals, we can overcome so many things.  We are faced with great adversities right now, but we can come out on the other side.  The options of peace, joy, and abundance are available to us.  We must however choose these things.  Some of these choices are rather easy, some are harder, but we can make them.  Within us is this ability and imagination to choose many beautiful things. 

My Twitter and Instagram feeds are full of these choices.  People are helping their neighbors and checking in on each other.  People are getting out and being fit and healthy by taking walks, jogging and bicycling.  There are a lot of people out there with the ability to make protective equipment for medical professionals, and they are doing it.  These are all beautiful things, and we are doing them amid uncertainty, chaos, and fear.

Chaos, uncertainty, and fear rarely last forever.  Life will likely get back to something resembling “normal” at some point.  The choices we make then matter a lot. We can choose to keep doing the beautiful things we have started during this virus scare.  We can use our adaptiveness to make things better so maybe this won’t happen again.  We have a lot of choices ahead of us.  I am grateful we at least have a choice and ability to adapt and overcome.

The coronavirus is likely to pass in some time, most pandemics do.  We still have many other challenges that will remain.  If we can adapt and quarantine and overcome this virus, we have within us the strength to do many things.  We can reshape economies to show dignity and respect for all people.  Governments can be held accountable and corruption snuffed out.  As a people what happens to us is partly what we allow to happen to us.  We can choose a beautiful life for ourselves, and a beautiful society for our neighbors.  Our resourcefulness and imaginations hold all the answers.  We have found the answers before and we can find them again.  For these things I am grateful and because of them I have hope.