Horses began to fascinate me, in real life, so I studied them and researched where I could ride one. In the story, we are getting close to where the magic begins. 

Scene 4: K Reads About Carousels and Gigi, and Then Wonders What It Would Be Like To Visit the Pier.

After months of delicious reading, Karen realized that her favorite topics were horses and amusement parks, especially amusement parks with carousels. She read everything she could about them. She went to the reference desk at the public library on Robertson and asked the librarian to help her find information on the Santa Monica Pier and on Griffith Park. She learned that the pier had opened in 1909 after sixteen months of construction. The pier’s art deco hippodrome housed the carousel. That was only one part of the pier, but it was her favorite part to read about. It was Santa Monica’s first historic landmark. Griffith Park, in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, had been donated by Col. Griffith J. Griffith even earlier, in 1896. He had donated over 3,015 acres of land to the city of Los Angeles. Both places had world-famous carousels.

Her favorite book was Gigi: The Story of a Merry-Go-Round Horse by Elizabeth Foster. She imagined a stunning Thoroughbred carrying her wherever her heart desired. She dreamt of becoming not only the best reader, but the best rider she could be. She would not be afraid to reach for the gold ring. She would not let her fear of falling stop her. She knew in her heart that if she could get to the carousel and up onto a horse, then she could reach all her other goals.
In her mind, she watched the handsome horses prance and whirl around her imagined carousel. Though nervous about going to a real amusement park, she knew that in time she would realize her vision, and that time was becoming her friend. To someone else, going to a carousel might seem trivial, but not to Kitten. She knew that, for her, it would not be easy, but she also knew that she would persevere. Many people believed Kitten’s partially paralyzed body was incapable of riding a horse, but Mama and Karen did not go along with such a barrier philosophy.

“What if I went to the amusement park and met the horse I dream of?” she whispered to herself, as she held a book in her tiny hands and gazed up at the stacks in the middle of the seemingly boundless library.

#cerebralpalsy #inspirationalwriting #carousels

©2020, Karen Lynn-Chlup. All rights reserved.