Welcome to my irrational fears

Published on 8 July 2011 12:00 AM

! water park high slide image

I was reminded of this one the other day after a coworker was describing her recent visit to a nearby waterpark. Don't get me wrong. I love waterparks. I love the mild adrenaline rush of riding the slides and hoping that my swimsuit isn't completely up my crack when I stand up. I love seeing the general jiggliness and awkward tanlines of my peers and waterpark cohorts.

What I don't love, due to an irrational fear, are the speedy slides.

As a fair, almost translucent, white person I am besotted with freckles and holy moley moles. They're not holy really, I'm just truly ashamed of my moles, so I try to spice them up a tad. Regardless, my irrational fear stems from a violent mental picture of myself speeding down the speedy slide, arms crossed vampire-style, reaching high speeds high enough to rub one of my moles off.

That's where my mind goes. Or, to make matters worse I imagine getting a mole pinched in one of the creases where the flume of the slides comes together. Because I know those things are just one, long smooth piece. They're a bunch of flume pieces put together with seams specifically designed for catching swimsuit grommets and my moles. I picture this happening, even with a cover up or tank top on.

And then after that, it's me in a blood bath at the bottom of the slide, crying and getting kicked out of the water park for contaminating the speedy slide with my anemic blood.

So I just steer clear of the speedy slides, and watch in awe as you tattooed, sun burnt, and smooth skinned (albeit jiggly) sons of guns fly through water, time and space. And I watch from the shade.

Enjoy summer!