One summer, I was home on leave, and my wife, daughter, and I went to see my brother Ron for a couple of days. My brother was working as a reserve Sheriff’s deputy because the county fair was currently going on. My brother’s wife suggested that the rest of us go to the county fair. Since my wife and daughter had never been to a County fair, I thought that would be a great idea. My two nieces and my daughter really enjoyed the carnival rides and it seemed like they were having a good time. My wife took my daughter over to ride on one of the smaller kid rides while my brother’s wife and older niece jumped on a ride called the Zipper. While they were riding the Zipper, I noticed that my younger niece had started to cry. I asked her what was wrong. She told me that she wanted to ride on the zipper in the worst possible way, but nobody would ride with her. I asked her if it was because they had already ridden on the ride, or if it was because they thought she was too small. She said she didn’t know. But she said that they wouldn’t ride with her. I thought, “Man, that’s just mean. It’s one thing not to ride with somebody because you think they’re too small and they might get scared or hurt or both. But it’s something else totally not to ride with them just because.” This particular situation seemed like a case where mom and big sister just wanted to ignore little sister. I wasn’t entirely sure why that was. Sometimes I feel like it is my solemn obligation to root for the underdog, even if that means doing something that I really, really do not want to do. And let me tell you something. Getting on the Zipper was not my idea of fun. No sir. If you are familiar with carnival rides, you probably know what the Zipper is. The Zipper consists of a series of chair-shaped cages attached to an elongated series of wheels, cables, and metal framing that spins around in circles while the whole arm of the machine revolves around an upright arm. I know I’m not doing it justice trying to describe it, but I hope you get the idea. The elongated series of wheels, cables, and metal framing that revolves around the upright arm can either spin forward or backward. Keep that little detail in mind. There will be a test later. Well, like I said, the Zipper is not exactly my idea of fun. Not at all. But I told my niece that I would ride on the Zipper with her. When I saw her eyes light up like a Christmas tree, I knew she would be very happy if I did that. However, I immediately regretted saying that I would ride on that contraption with her. But I dutifully got in line with her and we got into one of those cages, and we got strapped in. When the ride started spinning round and round and the cage started spinning round and round, I knew exactly why this was not one of my favorite rides. In fact, the Zipper was on my list of rides to avoid at all cost if possible. And that night was going to remind me in no uncertain terms exactly why the Zipper was on that list. As luck of the draw would have it, my niece and I drew a cage on one end of the elongated arm. Essentially, that doesn’t really mean much because the cages are always moving as soon as the ride starts. The problem is that inertia has a lot to do with where your cage ends up when everything is said and done, and the ride stops. I think dumb luck also has something to do with it. Since we started at the end of the elongated arm, our cage stopped at the end of the elongated arm. But that didn’t happen when the ride was over. Oh no. We didn’t have that kind of luck. Our cage stopped at the top end of the elongated arm when the guy switched the rotation from forward to backward. Notice that I said that our cage stopped! That is key. The cages weren’t supposed to stop. However, something went haywire with the machine. Yeah. It was a typical carnival ride. It was in poor mechanical shape, and it was overworked. That was a recipe for disaster. And disaster is exactly what we got. When the guy switched the rotation of the elongated arm from forward to backward, the machine should have kept right on running. That’s what it should have done. But it didn’t. It stopped. Dead. When it stopped, my niece and I were at the top swinging in the wind in a cage. Then my niece got scared. When a little girl gets scared, the first thing she does is scream. The second thing she does is cry uncontrollably. It took me a minute or so to calm her down and get her to stop crying. We were up there swinging in the breeze for what seemed like an hour. It was probably more like six or seven minutes. Finally, they got the machine fixed and they got us down and out of the cage. I asked my niece if she wanted to have another go. She emphatically shook her head no. Yeah. Neither did I. There was no way in hell I was getting on a Zipper again (or so I told myself at the time). That was truly the Zipper from hell, forcing me on another exercise in futility in the company of my niece.
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