I owe Kentucky’s state parks system my life and I’m only slightly exaggerating | Opinion

If it weren’t for the Kentucky State Parks system I wouldn’t be alive today. Now that’s an odd thing to say, I recognize, yet it’s true.

My parents met in the 1970s when they both worked at Carter Caves State Resort Park. My mom worked the front desk and my dad worked the midnight shift.

Now my dad knew my mamaw, who herself worked there for many years already. She worked in housekeeping and they would intersect when my dad would pass off papers to the housekeeping staff on who was staying or checking out so they knew which rooms needed cleaning.

I’ve had a drip feed of information on how my parents met over the years, but I needed to call my mom for the full story. In the interest of journalism.

She said my dad approached her a couple of times when she worked the front desk (which was not during his regular shift), driving out under the pretense that he was coming to buy a newspaper from the lodge; specifically the Ashland Daily Independent.

“And I was like, ‘They don’t sell them in Olive Hill? That’s strange,’” my mom recounted to me.

Eventually, my dad asked her out on their first date — the Carter Caves Christmas party. She said they both danced quite a bit and remembered my dad was a “fabulous dancer,” which he very much was, even later in life when carrying a cane.

Before I trudge on any further, I have to address that I’m only able to recount this version of events from my mom’s perspective. My dad, Gregory Henderson, died four years ago. I won’t tarry on this point longer than necessary but I will say it was a privilege and honor to learn and appreciate who my father was as I myself became an adult, and I grieve that my time with him was cut short.

My dad was gregarious, which you can’t spell without Greg, and also incredibly stubborn at times. I say this with certainty as I’m the same. He proposed to my mom three separate times before she said yes. The reason she waited?

“I intended it to be for life and I wanted to make sure. I had to make sure, I didn’t want to rush into anything,” she told me.

So he asked in July and then August and then over Labor Day weekend my mom finally said yes on the lodge patio of Jenny Wiley State Resort Park, yet another state park to add into the story.

You know how when you live somewhere all your life you really take for granted how incredible the things right in your backyard are? In the interest of not letting this moment pass me by, I want to take a moment to really sing some praises to our state parks.

An ode to Kentucky’s state parks

First of all, I was on the brochure for Carter Caves when I was about three or four years old. My mom, who was the park’s event coordinator at the time, was going around with a Department of Parks photographer through some caves and I went along with her.

Evidently I had the makings of a child model (I’ve grown out of that) and the photographer thought me and my bright yellow shorts would make a good picture as I stared longingly at the rock formations in X Cave.

Family reunions, school class trips, wedding receptions, the haunted trail, mini golf, cave tours, church picnics, camping out, winning a free round of golf for my cat in a raffle and my high school graduation party were all at Carter Caves.

My fiancée and I even took our engagement photos there earlier this year. Megan Denise, our photographer, told us she had never been to Carter Caves before and fell in love with it during our shoot! So much so she told us it would be a new addition on her roster of locations for clients.

Upon further reflection, and talking to my mom to jog my memory, I realized I have so many fond memories of Kentucky’s state parks.

At Pennyrile Forest State Resort Park, my dad and I evidently buried something there, which my mom believes may have been an item from my Easter basket. I was maybe five or six.

In 2013 when I was at Murray State University for the Governor’s Scholars Program my parents and I had lunch at Lake Barkley State Resort Park during parents’ weekend and looked out over the lake.

A dear friend of mine had her wedding and reception at Rough River Dam State Resort Park, and I was in her bridal party. She originally wanted me to officiate but her mom shot that idea down; that’s neither here nor there.

My mom and aunt met my fiancée’s parents for the first time at General Butler State Resort Park.

Murder mystery dinners at Greenbo, a quick pit stop at the Lincoln Homestead, praying for a moonbow to appear over Cumberland Falls, hiking to Natural Bridge, seeing the Stephen Foster Story and touring “My Old Kentucky Home.”

Without even knowing it, Kentucky’s state parks became an integral part of my life. In a very real sense, these parks helped me become the person I am today and I think many other Kentuckians would agree.

My sincerest appreciation

Kentucky’s state parks are, in my opinion, Kentucky’s greatest natural asset, and that’s to say nothing of the state parks being there for people seeking refuge from the devastating natural disasters that have hit the state in recent years. Which is what makes the state’s lack of funding into the parks over the years especially despicable.

Kentucky State Park Commissioner Russ Meyer said financial problems in the last few decades led to many state budget cuts that deeply hurt our parks and led to many deferred maintenance projects.

Former Gov. Matt Bevin announced a $50 million “makeover” to kickstart infrastructure projects in 2019. Gov. Andy Beshear and the General Assembly have since approved operational budgets and infrastructure spending, which includes $130 million for state park projects this year.

“They’re the people’s parks and our governor and General Assembly made a big statement of supporting our parks, and setting them up for the future by funding them. It’s a bipartisan issue,” Meyer said.

In my opinion, $130 million is a paltry sum given the numbers of years that lacked meaningful investments; albeit appreciated all the same. Our state parks are the crowning jewel of Kentucky and if I had it my way I’d send the state a bill for $130 billion instead.

Going back to the beginning here, is it an exaggeration to say that I owe my life to Kentucky’s 100-year-old state parks system? I mean it’s possible my parents could’ve met anywhere else, but they also couldn’t have met each other at all if not for Carter Caves.

Daniel Boone, the American pioneer and frontiersman, is often credited with the saying, “Heaven must be a Kentucky kind of place.” There’s a good chance Boone never said that, or wrote it, and it could be, perhaps, first properly attributed to a traveling preacher named Isaac Reed in a February 1818 letter.

Heaven is not a “Kentucky kind of place,” because heaven, presumably, lacks horses and bourbon.

However, I’m certain some higher divinity did reach down into these hills and mountains, gorges and caves, rivers and waterfalls and lush bluegrass to impart a sweet kiss upon this land allowing us the opportunity to cherish its grandeur for all of our days.

We then have a responsibility, nay an obligation, to cherish and protect this nature, and that includes our state parks.