I always drank from the lion's mouth upon entering the park and prior to leaving it,for good luck, part of my advanced self preservation techniques.
There's a group on Facebook Nation I had never heard of until the other day. The group, "I Played at Dennis the Menace Park and Lived!" currently has over 2000 members, up 200 members from just 9 days ago.
As soon as I got home, I joined the group because I could totally relate to the theme. Yes, as a child I had my own near death experience at Dennis the Menace Park.
Crossing this rickety, creaky, swaying bridge always felt like walking the plank, and still does!
My near fatality involved the park ride. Oh yes, Dennis the Menace had rides back then. But it wasn't powered by electricity. No, it was powered by little legs. Legs of children, which must have been against child labor laws, even back in the olden days.
The ride spun around, which wouldn't have been a problem if it had been anywhere near the ground. But it was at least 6 feet in the air. Visualize merry go round in the sky. Maybe, I'm exaggerating, but it was always over my head, and I was a very tall child.
Anyways, on this particular go around I was part of the power grid. As I was jumping off the ride, to run along the top of the cement wall, to keep the ride going, I missed the wall, slipped off, and slid down the wall facing it.
The Ride of Death may be gone, but the Wall of Shame still stands.
Of course, this didn't stop me from powering the ride, but from then on, I was very careful, as I stepped off the moving ride onto the wall. Live and learn.
And as far as I can tell the park has only gotten slightly better, since the ride is no longer there.
"Mommy that's a long way down!" says Gio trembling.
Last summer I took both of my kids to Dennis the Menace. First of all, one major problem with the park is: it's huge! And my kids decided they wouldn't be playing together that day. Or with the other kids we came with. So if I wasn't watching them in horror on the top of the train, my time in park hell was spent looking for them.
However, every time I found one kid, it seemed I lost the other.
"The Maze." The bushes were never see-through when I was a kid.
My parenting style leans towards hovering. So, the anxiety that starts to creep from my stomach to my brain can be overwhelming and often leads to child abduction hallucinations, when my kids are out of sight.
Am I breathing? No.
It wasn't so bad with my oldest son, but when I lost the two year old, I was freaking out on the inside. Eventually, I found him on the swing chatting it up with a little girl and her Dad.
I walked over to get Gio and the Dad asks in a wow you are the worst parent I've ever seen voice, "Is this your kid?"
I thought about saying "No," and walking away. But I did the right thing. I turned myself in, and confessed with a shameful, "Yes."
"Well, he's been over here with us for five minutes," he says sternly.
I felt so small. He could have squashed me like an ant. But then my son would have spent the rest of his life forever trapped in a campy Disney movie, without a Mom.
Needless to say, we've only been back once, but I only had one child and the park, as you can see from the pictures, was empty. Some day, I will go back to Dennis the Menace with both kids.
Yes, some day we'll all return when I'm finished with my post traumatic stress disorder therapy and the nightmares cease, or are at least less frequent.
13 comments:
Hahaha!!! I believe I belong to that group on facebook too!! I totally remember that the maze never had see-through bushes. You could not even think about going through those old bushes, they were very thick. That old ride, the ride of death, cannot remember that one to save my life. Great posts and totally miss you!
I was hoping for a picture to jog the memory banks, but it never panned out. You are probably too young to remember the ride of death. I miss you too!
The Ride of Death... my brothers and I have all fallen off that one many a times. I always wondered what was on the other side of the hill but was too afraid to wander over there.
Yes I remember kids constantly falling off that ride. I'm sure no one noticed my fall, those were such regular occurences.
I still have not reovered from my experience with the writer of this blog at Dennis the Menace Park. The first time I saw her as a young child on the top and I emphasize on "top" of the train, i died a Mother's silent death. I calmly told her to come down. A very hard thing to do being Scilian. I did nor know about her near death experience untill now!
AND, I still do not like that suspension bridge. You have to pay me alot of money to go accross it.
Fear of the bridge runs in the family apparently. Sorry about the train picture.
hey pikaki: on the other side of the hill from the copter you could risk your life on an extremely narrow wire-mesh balance beam that always had sand on it, causing a small child to cartoonishly slip as if on a banana peel and plummet to the sand. you were wise beyond your years to have stayed away.
I forgot about that balance beam!
Thanks so much for posting these pics! Between these and the FB group, it's totally taking me back (I frequented the park while growing up in Salinas in the 70's).
It's funny how everyone remembers it as a badge of honor to have "survivived" it. I just remember it as a great place to play and explore. But after reading everyone's posts, though, I guess some of the structures WERE pretty crazy (the Kid-B-Q slide, the bridge of doom, the infamous helicopter, etc.) Still, when you're a kid, it's just FUN.
DTMP was one of a kind. It's a shame our kids won't have the same thing (treacherous metal structures and all...)
John
Sacramento, CA
Thanks for the comment John. Actually even though it isn't quite as treacherous as it used to be, watching my kids on top of the train is a bit nerve racking.
If you joined the group a while ago, you might want to check and re-join it - when the group system thingy was revamped a while ago, I suddenly realized I wasn't a member anymore and had to rejoin.
LOVED that place before they messed with it. I keep 1/2 expecting to see myself in some of those old photos!
Wish I had been as fast to learn, I'm not even sure just how many times I fell off the helicopter, but I kept getting back on for more, so it must have been something :)
Thanks! I will check it out on fb to see if I'm still a member. I have a feeling I'm not.
I also grew up in Monterey and today is my birthday and I am having a wonderful flash back now of the train, the big slide and mostly the dangerous flying dearth trap- I loved it- I would hang from the front bars and run up the side of the cement wall, it was great! As a parent now, i would be like, "don't hang from the bars!" but only cos I did it already and no one else should get scraped up like that lol! I was a weird kid, I also loved taking walks in the cemetery across the way!
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