Yesterday’s trip to Universal Studios was something I had been looking forward to for quite a while. I have been there a number of times before, but this one was to be special.
This time I was to be in the company of Erin, my little granddaughter. She is a big Harry Potter fan and this was her first time being exposed to the creative minds of the whole Universal experience.
When we reached Diagon Alley, she literally leaped with joy and her excitement reached fever pitch. At the young age of seven, this was her first time stepping out of the pages of the books that Victoria has faithfully been reading with her and seeing first-hand how the world of Harry Potter looks like in “real life”.
Any words I could use to describe the place would be a misunderstatement, so I won’t even attempt to. But suffice to say that it is well worth the visit.
I didn’t go on any rides (they aren’t my thing) so I mainly just followed my three fellow-adventurers and chronicled their experience with my lens.
I haven’t included any of the family shots here but only some of the shots that I took of the experience itself. They are here at the end of the blog … I hope you enjoy.
In distancing myself from the front-line visitor experience, I largely drew my own experience from the sight and sounds of Erin as she encountered magical moment after magical moment.
Her “oohs” and “aahs” were palpable and they gave me a true experience that no theme park could ever emulate.
As I drove home, I had a broad smile across my face; a smile of having had a wonderful time with those I love and also a smile of rejuvenated outlook on some of the world around me.
We forget the excitement as we grow older, as most things we experience have already been experienced before. It is difficult for life to serve us up something to which we have no experience or imagination of.
But through the eyes of a child we get to witness joys, wonder, and excitement that are at once innocent and wild.
Some people try to rein in their child’s reaction, insisting that they shush or use their indoor voice. They become overly conscious of how the strangers around them might judge them.
But the adults that unbridle their child’s emotions tend to carry the broadest of smiles as they truly share the experience with their child.
I am not talking for a moment about bad or raucous behavior; I very much agree that this should be stamped out. But I am talking about letting out the emotional line so that our children can run with it.
Never subdue a child’s smile. For they brighten the world in a way that no candle ever can.
When it comes to our own daily lives, it is very difficult to remember, let alone retain, any of the wonder that the world has to offer.
What I have found is that technological or artistic developments produce a limited scope of wonder into our lives. And it wears away quickly.
Try describing the first time you saw color television to someone and if you are greeted by more than a blank look, I would be surprised. Where is the wonder in that?
However, the natural world, if we allow it, can produce an everlasting sense of wonder if we are but willing to breathe it in..
It plays out beside us every day and yet never runs dry in its production of beauty and drama.
But the big difference between mad-made and natural wonder is that the former allows us to be mainly passive, while the latter requires us to be mostly active.
As we went through Universal yesterday, our enjoyment didn’t require us to do hardly anything but just be entertained. And don’t get me wrong; it was terrifically entertaining.
But the natural world requires us to explore, seek out, stop and scrutinize, and yes, understand what it is we are experiencing. We need to walk a trail, keep our wits about us, and occasionally lift a leaf to see what is underneath.
This world is not organized and on display for us and neither does it perform for us at scheduled times. It doesn’t come with express lines or souvenir shops, yet the memories we take away can be life-transforming and life-lasting.
Erin joins me on a trail on Tuesday morning before they all fly back to Chicago and I hope to witness some more memories for her on her journey through life.
She and I may be on opposite ends of life’s story but there is still so much for me to learn by drawing from her experience of it.
So here is what I am trying to say. Go ahead and accompany a child on a natural experience somewhere. It doesn’t even matter what that experience is… only that we experience it through their bright eyes and not our own tired and dull ones.
… just a thought.
