Adventureland

            I must have filled out about thirty applications over the spring and the beginning of summer. A few employers called me up, but they were quick to make a decision once they found out that I had to go back to college for my sophomore year in the fall. “We don’t want to spend the time training you if you’re not going to be here for long,” they would say. I couldn’t really blame them for that, but I was still pretty frustrated by the time June rolled around. I needed money. Books alone had cost me at least $800 over my last two semesters, not to mention any expenses involved if I wanted to go out and have fun. But the economy was down and I was a college student; those two things combined made finding a job pretty difficult.

            I was about to give up when my mother mentioned Adventureland. It’s a theme park near my hometown on Long Island. I had gone there as a kid but had outgrew the place by the time I was fourteen. My mother had to offer me a ride over there in order to motivate me to give the job hunting effort one last shot.

It was raining that day so the park was empty, heavy drops splashing onto the stilled rides. The place was pretty much how I remembered it; the Pirate Ship ride with the mermaid painted onto its center, the Ferris wheel, the Swing Ride, the Haunted House, the small roller coaster that I had thought was huge before I went to Six Flags and learned what a real roller coaster looked like. I left my mom in the car and went into the food court to ask for an application. The manager was the only one in there and he hired me on the spot.

Telling people I worked at Adventureland was a conversation-starter given that a movie based on someone’s experiences working at the park during the 80s had been released earlier that year. The exchanges generally went like this:

“THE Adventureland?” the amazed acquaintance would ask.

“Yes, THE Adventureland.”

“Is it anything like the movie?”