A step-by-step approach to going to Six Flags Magic Mountain, in the rain, on Superbowl Sunday:
Start by doing 80 up the I-5 in the pouring rain. The park opens in 15 minutes, we have to get there on time or we somehow lose the entire value of a full day’s admission by not squeezing every last ounce of enjoyment out of the park.
Add your 11-year-old son in the back seat, about to turn 12, and his friend, both alternating their concern between the park being completely packed, or being closed due to the rain.
Ask, “Well, which is it?” a couple of times. Receive blank stares in the rearview mirror.
Arrive at the park, learn that 9 rides are closed. Get worried, until you see one closed ride is called “Déjà Vu.” Ask ticket clerk about that ride. She responds, “It like a lot of other rides.” Look around to see of that’s some kind of a setup.
Buy tickets. Learn they are year-long passes. Same price as one day. Now you must drag the boys into the Year Pass building to get their picture taken. They act like you’re asking them to go swimming in sulphuric acid. It takes 3 minutes.
Enter the park. A lot of rides are based on movies, but you feel like the park could be based on “I Am Legend,” due to utter lack of patrons. The image is reinforced when pale group huddles together like mutants from that movie. They turn out to be (actor and “Robot Chicken” genius) Seth Green and friends.
Climb hill. Learn why they call it “Magic Mountian:” even though it’s only a hill, it magically feels like you’ve climbed K2 when you get to the top.
Get on “Tatsu” ride. Stare down at gum, spit and earrings that form in patterns on the sheet metal below you every place you stop. Feel pockets for keys, electronics. Repeat 9 times. Wonder if the ride is gradually centrifuging the blood to the back of your head.
Try to keep up with the boys as they run the length of the park to get on the farthest ride next: “Goliath.” Notice the park is sparsely populated with nerds and Oakland Raider fans. The only gang members in attendance actually work there.
Ride Goliath. Black out. Confirm that the blood is being centrifuged to the back of your head. The pounding in your forehead tells you it’s not coming back.
Have a breakthrough: let the boys ride the rides without you. Learn this only works for one ride. Walk a half-mile to the Batman ride. Contemplate writing “Do Not Resuscitate” on the skin of your chest with a Sharpie.
Ride Collossus ride 3 times. Note with mild alarm you cannot recall all 4 members of the Beatles, the 2nd Grade, or whose idea it was to come to this damned place. Stare at the back of Seth Green’s head while you pull 3 g’s in the drizzle, and realize you would rather be watching this all on TV.
Spend most of your remaining cash on ring-toss, Skee-Ball and T-shirts. Note that the only bargain here is the dollar refills on the souvenir cups. Buy the cups, but feel too sick to refill them. Wonder if the nerve damage to your tongue from the Dippin’ Dots, served at 7 degrees Kelvin, will be permanent. Wish that was the only souvenir you’re taking home.
Ride Goliath for the fourth time. Wonder if Fabio’s neck felt as bad as yours after he was hit in the face with a duck at Six Flags Busch Gardens. Try to look nonchalant doing 90 mph for souvenir photo. Buy the photo. Note how bad you look.
Exit park, 2 minutes before closing. Stagger to car as son, friend ask, “Are you all right?” Note that turkey legs have the same reverb characteristics as a Slim Jim.
Get to car. Look back at park, silhouetted against a beautiful California sunset. Marvel: partly at the beauty, but mostly because, when you squint just right, it looks like the whole damned place is burning to the ground.
Resign yourself that it is not burning, that you have a new annual pass in your pocket, and that suicide is a mortal sin.
Point car towards home. Feel relief nibble at the edges of your frayed nerves: the radio plays something you like, not just Danny Elfman incidental music. In with the good feelings, out with the bad.
Your son, happy, wind-burned and smiling, pipes up from the back seat, completely spooking the timid sense of serenity you were trying to coax into your mind: “Dad, that was great. We have to do this every year on Superbowl Sunday!”
“Of course!” you immediately holler. You look into the rearview mirror at the boys, exhausted, staring into their goody bags. You catch sight of yourself in the mirror: that same grinning idiot from the ride snapshot, but now the face has a little blood back, and is grinning from ear to ear.
“Of course.”
