Wave Pools, Lightning Bugs, Life, etc

Have you ever been in a wave pool?

They’re a lot of fun. I love them. I really love them. They’re probably my favorite part of water parks. But that’s not what I really want to talk about tonight.

Can we talk about life? More specifically, the wave pool-ish effect of life. For those out of touch with their inner wave pool, a wave pool is essentially a giant pool. With waves. You hang out in this big pool, chilling and doing normal pool activities and then suddenly a huge wave attacks. Over and over and over.

There’s a feeling that comes with happiness. A big ball of energy. All of a sudden, you’re alive. You can SEE. Everything makes sense. You feel like it’s all been worth your while. You don’t mind waking up before the sun. You greet every miserable, forsaken rain drop as an old friend, but you don’t mind their presence. You don’t mind anything. It can happen with love, friendship, success or for no reason at all. The only thing that’s important is that is does happen. Everyone deserves to be happy, right?

It always fades though. The sun that once illuminated you becomes a lightning bug, flickering with life. Fireflies don’t last long in captivity though and we are generally too selfish to let them out of our jars. So we keep them. Cling to their last effort of light until it fades away into death.

I guess we need it. The cycle of life and death. High and low. They keep us in balance. Without sad we wouldn’t know happy and all that junk. But it sucks. No one wants sad. Not when they’ve had happy before. That’s what happens in the wave pool. You’re in the pool thinking This is great! I’m having so much fun in this pool! when the first wave sends you tumbling towards the bottom, frantically trying to paw your way back to the surface gasping for breath. There’s something so life-threateningly real about nearly drowning. It wakes you up. You fight to stay above the surface, straining against the waves’ influence. You fight for your life. And then you get it. You figure out the pattern. You know how to beat it, how to stay afloat. Safe. And it’s fun. It’s a blast! You got it. You conquered that wave. And that one and that one. That feeling of overcoming obstacles creates happiness. A feeling of progress. Of doing something different and exciting for once.

We all know that nothing good lasts, though. The waves die out. They lose their light. And then you’re back in the pool. The wave-less pool. This time, though, the pool is almost boring. It’s nowhere near as scary/exciting/awesome as the waves. Once you have experienced the waves, a world without waves is dull. Yet we stay in. Why? Because, in the end, more waves are only a few minutes away.