Coffee shop vibes exist around me. I took a trip down to Orlando to hang out with my girlfriend and our friends before school starts back up on Monday. A moment in time. I’m in my home state but I’m three hours away from my actual home. Nevertheless, it’s good to be back. We all went to Universal yesterday, and as the rides shot us into the air it felt like we could see the whole universe. The drops of the roller coaster made my heart feel like it was going to come out of my chest. It was thrilling. The best moments of the day existed when we weren’t on the rides, though. The best moments of the day existed in the moments some would call boring, but they were moments we saw opportunity.
The length of lines at amusement parks can be disheartening. Walking up to rides that we want to go on and seeing that it will be a 75-minute wait led us to pursue rides with shorter wait times. Across the park was a ride with a five-minute wait time. That was an obvious candidate for us to pursue. In hindsight, it was quite the mistake. Our need to pass through the lines as fast as possible led to us getting on a ride that soaked us in water, which led to us all standing in a human dryer for the price of a dollar a minute. Needless to say, we subjected ourselves to the lengthy lines from then on. Those lines brought us closer as a group. All but one of us had left our cell phones in the lockers, so to entertain ourselves we started playing geography and word games. Trying to figure out a state or city that starts with the last letter of the last state or city that was said brought a lot of laughs. Let me tell you, after half an hour of this game it is hard to come up with a state, city, or country that starts with an A. By the time the game ended, we joked that we felt like we had just taken the SAT. Creating our own personal SAT brought us closer together as a group and brought us fun in moments that usually would be considered boring.
Being back in my home state has been a great experience. This morning I went to Waffle House for breakfast, which brought back memories of my childhood. Soon I will be on a plane back to Oberlin. Really I never left, though. While I was in New York this Thanksgiving break Oberlin was with me. Oberlin is with me now in Florida. Oberlin is not just a place, Oberlin is a beautiful reality you take with you wherever you go. Whether it be the skyscrapers of New York or the long lines of Universal, the beauty of Oberlin follows.
