OK, not really all the time but at times it really does; We just got back from Kings Island, an amusement park for those who don’t know.  It was my company picnic and we had rented out the whole park, which was really nice.

King’s Island owns the rights to all the Nickelodeon characters so Alora was very excited to see Dora and Boots and all her favorite characters (If you don’t know who they are then you are lucky.)  Well one of the rides that was themed was a Swiper the Fox ride, another character from Dora.  It is what we always called a whip.  You sit in a car attached to the center of the ride by a bar and the track is oval and when you reach the turn it whips you around.

Well this was the first ride Alora really wanted to ride that we couldn’t ride with her…EVER.  Daddy was not OK with it but we decided to let her go and she was having a great time until the ride started and she hit that turn.  She screamed like someone had just hit her and although we positioned ourselves at each turn to encourage her she screamed the entire time.  I haven’t felt that bad since this day. I was almost crying as much as she was by the time it was over.

To make matters worse they have added seat belts that you can’t open without a key to all the kids rides to prevent children, or their parents from getting them out.  The silly boy running the ride didn’t start with the child who was crying, he started with the one closest to him.  Luckily Alora is so small Heather was able to pull her out of the seat belt.

Well, Alora handled it better than I did because she saw a Diego ride and I showed her it wasn’t just for boys.  It was a nice little merry go round type of ride where she could drive a car in circles.  She rode this and had a great time.

Finally, she decided to ride another driving ride where she would go all over a winding track, again without Daddy.  But she was more prepared than I was in fact by the time she was halfway through I was crying because my little girl was growing up.  As she drove away from me on that track, I can just imagine her driving away from me to go to School.  I am sooooo not ready for that.

I am glad Mark Driscol encouraged me in the fact that it is fine for a man to cry if it involved his daughter because I think I am going to be doing it a lot more in the future.