What About Me?

I'd overheard Mom & Dad talking about how they were going to go away for another long weekend before the end of the summer. Actually, I snooped Mom's history on AOL and figured out that they were planning a trip to Ithaca, NY. It's a quaint college town nestled up in the foothills in the Finger Lakes region. It's got small town charm energized by a large student population from Cornell University and Ithaca College, rustic B&B's, good restaurants and BLAH,BLAH, FREAKIN' BLAH...

Hey, what about ME??!!!

Now, you all know that I'm not the complaining type, but geez, yet another jolt of radiation and right back into the kennel for another swell weekend of concrete smackin' good times! Come On!

I put my foot down and demanded that they do something for me for a change. Mom thought that it sounded like a good idea, but Dad asked "Do you think all the money I've spent on radiation and vaccines was for ME?" Since I'd finished the last of the treatments a few days before all of this came up, I felt emboldened enough to join Mom in "laughing him off". Looking back, I don't really remember anyone laughing...


When Mom asked me where I wanted to go for my special day, I could think of only one place -- Coney Island. I'd been dreaming of the day when I could relive my mispent youth by hanging out on the boardwalk, drinking beer from a can hidden in a paper bag, getting wasted and going for a ride on the Wonder Wheel. They agreed to take me, but Dad said that I couldn't have any beer because of my meds and that he would get drunk for the both of us. I clearly remember Mom NOT laughing at that.


Boy, did we have a swell time. I put on my "Pits For Peace" shirt and strolled the boardwalk for a while. A few people even stopped to take my picture! The live-human-target "Shoot The Freak" paintball attraction was closed (bummer), so we headed to Deno's Wonder Wheel Amusement Park. I went on the Bumper Cars and the Spook House Ride and tried to win some stuffed animals at the "One In Wins" stand. After we noshed a few red hots at Nathan's, we all went up for a ride on the Wonder Wheel! It's a really tall, really cool, 85+ year old Ferris Wheel, but I wasn't scared at all!
You can see for miles from up there! The wide beach and ocean, Brighton Beach, the New York Aquarium, the Cyclone roller coaster, soon to close Astroland Amusement Park, the old Parachute Drop ride... even Manhattan! Come along for the ride with me!





We were up so high up and were having so much fun that, even if for just a few spins around that big old wheel, it felt as if we were soaring far away from all the sad things we'd left on the ground. And hey, you know, from waaay up there, everything looks a million miles away...