This entry title sounds really deep. It's a bit misleading. This is a nice memory, but definitely not as life-altering at the title would suggest.
My first real job was working at Wild Water Kingdom when I was 14 /15 years old. Despite the long hot hours working outside in an airless pen filled with potent rubber tubes, it was a pretty good first job. Working in a water park was pretty awesome, since after your shift you could cool off with a few trips around the lazy river. It also served to learn an important lesson about wearing flip flops in public change rooms, as I remember getting a planter wart from going barefoot.
NB: I just Googled "planter wart" to add an educational picture to this post, but apparently Google only sees fit to show the most extreme disgusting cases available. I don't suggest looking them up.
One afternoon, a friend and I were manning the tube pen and noticed a cute little girl about 2 years old wandering around by herself near the wave pool. Since Wild Water Kingdom is crawling with kids, we watched her for a couple minutes to make sure she wasn't being chased by a parent. We figured she alone and I left my post to go bring her to the Lost Children's station. She was happy as, well, a kid in a water park, totally unphased at having lost her mother. I barely understood a word she said, but was able to figure out her name was Hope from the little gold bracelette she was wearing.
As we crossed the bridge over the lazy river, we were able to see the Lost Children's hut, where a young mother was bawling her eyes out...full convulsions, completely loosing it. She saw us coming down the stairs and raced over faster than I've ever seen a human being move. She grabbed her daughter and hugged the air out of her, then ran away, both of them crying now. It was such a touching scene that I still get a bit choked up when I think about it.
About a week later she wrote an email to the water park, thanking the staff for finding her daughter and apologizing for running away to fast to thank me herself.
Side note: At Wild Water Kingdom staff could earn "Hugo Bucks" when they did something above and beyond. At the end of the season, they had an auction for a bunch of cool stuff that you could purchase with your Hugo Bucks. I think I got a sweet 5 Hugo Bucks for that one :)
