Words of Wisdom Magazine 1 | Page 18

Sean Fuchs

A Wonderful Place

Have you ever visited somewhere so many times that with each visit it begins to feel more and more like home? I’m sure many have had this experience in their life and if they haven’t, it’s soon to come. Whether they’re young or old everyone has their own definition of the places or things they call home. For myself this place was somewhere no more than six miles from my house back in Connecticut. This place was called Brodie Park.

Many called it West Hill Lake due to the fact that the park was on the lake. Others like my friends called it Brodie Park, or Brodie for short, probably just because that was the name on the sign. We have all spent many hours there, making many memories and friendships that will stick with us for the rest of our lives. Brodie was a truly captivating place to hangout every aspect made it somewhere you wanted to be. With so much to do and explore, it was truly incredible.

This park held many features built in for the public's enjoyment. The skatepark where I spent a lot of my time during freshman and sophomore years was mediocre to say the least. To us however it was special. The moment you walked through the gates the rays of light bouncing off silver metal would make it feel as if you had just walked into the gates of heaven. The sounds of skate decks smacking the ground and tires rolling along metal were like ecstasy. Despite its small size it was the perfect escape for fifteen-year-old boys.

The children's playscape was located no less than fifty feet from the skatepark. Here housed the youngest children you would find at Brodie. From the skatepark you could hear children’s screams and cries as their parents let them run rampant in the slides and jungle gyms. We, as in me and my friends, tried to avoid this area to the best of our abilities. The only times we would venture there was when it was vacant, when it had become too late for the children to stay out or their parents just got bored. Being as old as we were and having a whole playscape to ourselves resulted in exponential amounts of fun. Of course because it was a park for small children the buildings and other attractions would be kind of dirty. It would make your skin all kinda dry to the point where you could feel a sort of residue, making you want to wash your hands immediately after contact. We would climb on the little buildings and do the things that would put us in the most danger. This would often lead to us getting more hurt than we would have at the skatepark. But we never cared; it was simply too much fun.