My two best friends (Jared & Cameran) took me to the water park for my birthday (now doesn’t this sound like the beginning of a children’s book…HA). Anyways, I have been wanting to go all summer and they took me for my birthday… skip over the fact that my birthday was about a month ago. Nevertheless, we went and nothing really earth shattering or revolutionary happened today, but I learned some good truth and experienced some sweet joy that I wanted to share.
We need more water park days.
We need more days where we relax and enjoy the company of others. We need more days where we stop thinking about our to-do lists and worrying about this and that. We need more days where we soak up the sun. We need more days where we look around and appreciate the little joys.
We need more water park days.
Cam & I were laughing about the fact that the water park is one of the most vulnerable places which kind of sounds weird, right? But think about it. We walk around with our swim suits on, no makeup, not really caring about what our hair looks like when we were just dunked underwater at the end of a slide, not being ashamed to pick the wedgie that the slide gave us, getting too close to people in the lazy river because you can’t really control where it goes, and screaming at the top of our lungs on the dark slide because why not?
We need more water park days.
Now maybe we could wear more clothing than people normally do at water parks, but I think we need to take the time to unplug and simply enjoy life. Yesterday, we left our phones in the car and just had FUN. We weren’t worried about who was posting on Insta or the things we had to do. The most I worried about was how awkward I looked trying to get going on this slide where you had to go head first.
We need more water park days.
One of my favorite moments of yesterday was when I was sitting waiting on Jared & Cam while they were on a slide. I was at the part of the park where the big bucket fills up with water and then spills over onto whoever is underneath. This probably sounds crazy but it was one of the most joyous moments to witness this scene of people standing underneath the bucket. I watched this one family of adults huddled together underneath giggling and screaming waiting for the water to pour on their heads. I watched another family of three little girls push their grandfather out in his wheelchair and they were huddled around laughing so hard waiting on the water. It was pure JOY.
We NEED more days like THIS.
Days where we take a break. Days where we huddle together and simply laugh. Days where we don’t care what we look like but soak in every moment of time that we have with the people around us.
We need more water park days.
I didn’t realize how much I needed one until I was there. I’ve been preaching for the past few weeks the importance of taking time to rest in the midst of all the craziness and busyness in order to avoid getting burnt out. All I have to say now is that I have NOT been doing a very good job of following my own advice. I’ve been going, going, going, and not allowing for my mind, my heart, anything to catch up.
We need more water park days.
We need more days where we go to the water park and on the way there we sing loudly the praises of our Savior in the car with our best friends. We need more days where we laugh like crazy at the fact we just flipped completely over in our 3 person tube at the end of the slide. We need more days where we leave our phones in the car and enjoy the company of others while we share PB &J’s for lunch.
We need more water park days.
emmashapp 