Have Your Ever Seen Water Dance?

HAVE YOU EVER SEEN WATER DANCE?

Once upon a time, in Berlin, Germany there was a man named Otto who, in 1939, put a musical water fountain together on a stage, and with a series of pumps, levers, electrical switches and bright lights, created the first “Waltzing Waters.”

Today, in Cape Coral, Florida, Otto’s grandson is doing the same thing. Michael Przystawik grew up in the musical fountain entertainment business. His father, Gunther, and Otto before him created the first and most sophisticated musical, lighted fountains that danced, swirled and swayed to Broadway Show Tunes. Michael has made technical improvements that have brought the fountains into the modern world of jazz, rock and contemporary music. His fountains, some of them over 150 feet wide and sending colorful plumes of water nearly 100 feet in the air to perfectly timed music are now located in many cities and parks around the world.

I recently wrote a book called Dying Dreams. It is a fictional story of a man who dies and enters the “spirit world.” When his children honor his memory by building a park and having Michael install the latest edition of a Waltzing Waters musical fountain, the spirit of their deceased father crosses the mist of the waters as a “portal” to communicate with his mortal family.

For the past forty years I have been associated with Michael’s father, and now Michael, where I have had the opportunity to see his shows hundreds of times. I have heard the comments that have come from the audiences who witness the shows. Many people have been mesmerized and transfixed on the beauty and tranquility they experience while watching something as simple as water “dancing,” and reflect on how they wish their departed loved ones would have liked to see that, and even imagine their faces appearing in the fading mist.

And now, as the future of one of America’s minor entertainment treasures contemplates the future, a possible opportunity exists for the “Water that Dances.” Last week, on April 12, the Waltzing Waters showcased the Hall of Fame induction for the USA Water Ski Foundation held at The Fantasy of Flight in Polk City, Florida. Thanks to the generosity of Kermit Weeks, owner of Fantasy of Flight who hosted the occasion alluding to the possibility that the Waltzing Waters may figure into the plan for something huge, something on a grand scale that he is planning for the property he owns at exit 44 along the Interstate 4 corridor between Tampa and Orlando.

Good things take time and great things take even more time. But, let us hope that some of Kermit’s plans materialize in my lifetime so that I don’t have to be watching the progress through the mist of Waltzing Waters. I love it when a plan comes together.