Prove Your Love at the Lakeside Park Carousel

My daughter was shouting it excitedly and I was thinking it (also excitedly - that's the great thing about keeping things to yourself, you're spared the public shaming): we wanted to ride on the shiny white horse adorned with the pink and blue gear. It was the prettiest of all the animals on the historic Lakeside Park carousel. Yes, that's the Lakeside Park made famous in Rush's song of the same name (..."so many mem-or-eees").

As we ran onto the carousel giggling (her, not me. Okay, me too - but only in my mind, with a little vocal leakage), I noticed that we had no competition for our chosen ride, we were the only fun seekers clambering for this fine specimen. How could this be? I wondered. Then I saw why: no hydrolics, it didn't go up and down. Duh. Also, I don't think the others really considered the aesthetics of their animal. Unthinkable for us! To have only plain brown horses as options would really put the droll in our drollery. Luckily, for our next ride we found two lovely brown ponies  with purple and blue, side by side, and bingo! They did go up and down. I didn't feel like such a novice this time.

The Lakeside Park carousel is very special. Handcarved between 1898 and 1905 in Brooklyn, New York, this Charles Looff original (no cheap knock-offs here) was first an amusement at Hanlan's Point in Scarborough, Toronto. It found its current St. Catharines home on Lake Ontario way back in 1921, and still functions using the original organ - complete with twirling dancing girls - which was restored in 1985 thanks to Lottario funds. It boasts 68 animals and  many of the horses tails still sport real horse hair (cool or gross, depending). The nostalgic sentiments are reflected in the teenage carousel operators' uniform of a blue newsboy cap and shorts with red suspenders over a white, short-sleeved dress shirt (you know that a little piece of them dies every time they get dressed for work but it's a nice touch). To top it all off, it's still only 5 cents a ride. Imagine! You can take the family down to Port Dalhousie with a twoonie and ride all day!

I was surprised to see that in addition to young children and their parents, there were many young, 20-something couples partaking in the 360 degree fun (and not in that annoying ironic way). The boyfriends were only too happy to straddle a horse to merry-go-round music alongside their sweeties, and I just found this so fascinating. I couldn't imagine Other Half doing the same, without some kind of substantial bribe and a promise to leave the camera in the car and never a word about it again. I mentioned my observation to my brother who was with us and his response was "If you're really into the girl, you'll do it." Hmmm...really? Is this true? Or are you simply a Carousel Guy or Not A Carousel Guy?

Enter Other Half as I'm writing this so I ask him. He says "It depends how much I'm trying to impress you." I can't believe he would even consider it under any circumstances, other than with our daughter. So I push and remind him we're married, so would he do it now? He smiles and shakes his head "Uhhh...no. I'd have nothing at stake." Ha! It's just as well, I didn't think I was marrying a Carousel Guy, I need the balance. Imagining myself with someone so much like me is far too frightening. And anyway, more nickels for me and the little one.