Grand Opening Words
Several community members shared their thoughts about the
community-built playground experience of Imagination Station.
A few of these thoughts are repeated below.
Ray Maurer, CPRP
Director of Parks, Recreation and Forestry for the City of Oconomowoc
Good afternoon and thank you for coming out on such a wonderful day to share in a very special occasion for Oconomowoc.
I had the pleasure of representing a few different roles throughout the building of this wonderful place.
1, as the Director of Parks, Recreation and Forestry for the City of Ocononomoc.
2, as a member of the Playground Steering Committee, and
3, as a parent of a child with special needs.
As Director of the Parks, Recreation and Forestry Department and on behalf of the City of Oconomowoc, thank you to the Playground Steering Committee, the Construction Captains and all the businesses and citizens that helped out in one way or another to make this project a reality. Your contributions to Imagination Station will be appreciated for generations and your hand prints are forever embossed on this structure.
As a member of the Playground Steering Committee, thank you to all the Committee members that spent countless hours to ensure that Imagination Station reflected the history of Oconomowoc, included many of the requests of the children of Oconomowoc and made sure to include activities for all ages and abilities. Although Cathie Schrieber and Jennifer Hilander wanted to maintain a low profile today, I would be remiss if I didn’t thank each of you individually for your vision, your leadership and your perseverance.
As a parent of a child with special needs, you have no idea what a place like this means to me. I can honestly say that each day during construction week, I spoke with at least one parent or caregiver of a child with special needs who was extremely grateful for this new opportunity for their child. Over and over I heard “this is amazing, my child is going to love coming here; thank you”.
Each time I heard that, a story that someone shared with my family shortly after we learned of my daughter’s diagnosis came to mind and I would like to share that with you in closing. It is called “Welcome to Holland”.
Welcome to Holland
By Emily Pearl Kingsley
I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability--to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It’s like this…
When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip--to Italy. You buy a bunch of guidebooks and make your wonderful plans. The Coliseum. The Michelangelo David. The gondolas in Venice. You may learn some handy phrases in Italian. It’s all very exciting.
After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives. You pack your bags, and off you go. Several hours later, the plane lands. The flight attendant comes and says, “Welcome to Holland.”
“Holland?!” you say, “What do you mean, Holland? I signed up for Italy! I’m supposed to be in Italy. All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”
But there’s been a change in the flight plan. They’ve landed in Holland, and there you must stay.
The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place full of pestilence, famine, and disease. It’s just a different place.
So you must go out and buy new guidebooks. And you must learn a whole new language. And you will meet a whole new group of people you otherwise would never have met.
It’s just a different place. It’s slower paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy. But after you’ve been there for awhile, you catch your breath, look around, and begin to notice that Holland has windmills, tulips and even Rembrandts.
But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy, and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there. And for the rest of your life you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”
And the pain of that will never, ever go away, because the loss of that dream is a significant loss.
But if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special and very lovely things about Holland.
Kia LaBracke
Imagination Station General Coordinator
Welcome and thank all of you for being here for the grand opening of Imagination Station. Can you believe we’re here just over one year after Design Day? Nothing short of a miracle – and one you made possible. We extend our utmost thanks and unending gratitude to the thousands of volunteers whose efforts have made this playground a reality.
Looking behind me, I see the fruit of nearly two years of dreaming. Dreaming that grew into a clear vision with two amazing champions, Cathy Schreiber and Jen Hilander. Their passion for this vision attracted a strong, talented and diverse team of willing volunteers who divided a monumental task into logical, if not bite-sized, pieces. That steering team then enlisted hoardes of community members ready and willing to do whatever it took to make Imagination Station a reality.
A favorite speaker of mine, Brian Tracy, said:
“The starting point of great success and achievement has always been the same. It is for you to dream big dreams. There is nothing more important, and nothing that works faster than for you to cast off your limitations and for you to begin dreaming and fantasizing about the wonderful things you can become, have and do.”
The message was clear: We can do this. But not alone. We can, as a community, raise a playground where kids of all abilities can play shoulder to shoulder. It won’t be easy. We’ll agonize about it. We’ll celebrate small victories. We’ll go back to the drawing board more times than we care to count. But in the end, we will do it.
Patricia Ramsey, an educational psychologist, said:
“Play, while it cannot change the external realities of children’s lives, can be a vehicle for children to explore and enjoy their differences and similarities and to create, even for a brief time, a more just world where everyone is an equal and valued participant.”
Some of our favorite moments came during build week. It was almost surreal to arrive on the site knowing that, indeed, we were building this playground!
Dropping off my daughter at the childcare one morning, a young girl, maybe four years old, blurted to the childcare coordinator, “My mom is building Imagination Station!” Her enthusiasm was unbridled and inspiring. It brought me back to the very beginning, on Design Day, when children throughout the area celebrated what at that moment was just a dream, a bare sketch, but completely clear in their minds – a park, a place in their own community that would be unlike any other.
They were already proud! A year before ground was broken! From Design Day on, I heard kids saying, “I helped design that park!” “We got to help draw the pictures!” They owned this dream long before the adults brought it around to fruition.
When we risked coming up short on food, we sent out the word to our volunteers and suddenly there was more than we could have hoped for. A day came where we needed tools and supplies. One phone call resulted in all those needs being met. The spirit of the project, the love and anticipation, carried us over every single hurdle.
Walking the site during build week, we heard the stories that let us know it was worth it. A mom whose now preteen autistic son’s condition kept them indoors during his early childhood because she couldn’t take him to a ‘normal’ playground. Parents who saw other community built playgrounds and knew Oconomowoc was the kind of place to make this happen. People who had no personal interest in the project but who were so proud that our community recognized a need and made it happen, despite the enormity of the task.
Today you bear witness to the celebration of a park that will likely be unparalleled here during your lifetime. Be proud, take ownership, protect this place and above all – have fun!
UNIVERSALLY ACCESSIBLE PLAYGROUND
