It was a wonderful day to take the family to one of our favorite places of all time, Frank and Erma’s Dinosaur Park, off route eighty nine. The kids were excited, with our youngest on her way to experiencing the park for the first time; keeping up, too, with her older brother and sister, singing road songs. A perfect day for us.
We’d brought a photo album that had pictures from prior trips. The kids liked looking at the pictures on the way, repeating the names of the dinosaurs and getting increasingly hyped about visiting the park, as the miles left to go decreased.
When we were about three quarters of the way to the park, traffic was tied up and moving slowly. The kids got restless. Then, the traffic stopped completely, and after about twenty five minutes of sitting still had gone by, the vehicles thankfully began to move again.
Finally we reached the park, or at least we thought we did. There were no lines of cars backed up, where there should have been. I wasn’t even sure if it was further up the road and my bearings were off, as I couldn’t find the entrance. I kept going, then turned around.
I stopped at a convenience store, empty except for the middle-aged lady behind the counter; when I asked, she said she was a new resident. She’d not heard of the park before, and by this time, I was beginning to suspect something must have happened.
But then a guy came out who’d overheard. “Dinosaur park went outta business about a couple of years ago, after they sold the place.”
“What is it now?” I asked; “They sold out and now it’s an old-folks home,” he said. He went on, saying, “They built the home on part of the land, and some of the dinosaur statues and things still remain.” I thanked him, got back in the car and then drove down the road to where I thought the entrance was, and then I saw it.
The old folks’ home was big and took up a lot of space; I couldn’t imagine where any dinosaurs would be. I tried to remember where the entrance had been. It was so different now, and without a landmark where I could get my bearings, I was lost.
Sadness.
I tried to cheer them up; I lied about a new dinosaur park coming soon.
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Sources for images used in this post:
(Public Domain photos are from Wikimedia Commons)
