"It's up to you to let a dream be a dream or to bring it to life." ― Giovannie de Sadeleer
The boat is not moving, and we're encased in utter darkness. I'm in the happiest place on earth, but sadly, something has gone terribly wrong.
There are ten of us in the boat, including my husband, most of my kids, their spouses, and my beloved granddaughters. This is our third ride of the day, and so far, our objective to acclimate the kids to the Disney experience has been a colossal disaster.
They're all bawling, or is that just me?
And it's not helping that this lighted skull floating above our heads with a sick-looking eye patch keeps reminding us over and over again, "Dead men don't tell tales," causing a fresh round of sobs every time it opens its mouth.
Can someone shut that thing off?
Then, the crazy people in the boat behind us start singing One Hundred Bottles of Beer On the Wall, laughing hysterically at the end of each chorus. It's only 9:00 am, and somehow I've become a damsel in distress on a broken ride in the bowels of Disneyland.
I do not have the emotional maturity to handle this.
Just when I'm about to scream, "Abandon ship, we'll forge the river and claw our way out of this dungeonous tomb (I can be overly dramatic when necessary)," a perky voice comes over the loudspeaker.
Now, remember, we're still cloaked in darkness, and she says, "Good morning, my pirate friends. As you can see, we need to get you all back on track and floating merrily along (understatement of the year). It's real easy now; just listen to me."
Her voice is elevated as if she's talking to a room full of five-year-olds, "Okay, now I need you all to start rocking side to side. That's right. You can do it. Give it a little more effort." I'm not kidding. We're responsible for getting our boat back on track by throwing our combined body weight from one side of the boat to the other. You can't make this shit up.
The boat starts rocking, and the kids are crying even louder, but nothing remotely good is happening—except the boat behind us has stopped singing. Praise be to God.
She adds, with a calm, stern voice, "Good job, pirates. Okay, now I need you to rock the boat from front to back. That's it. You've got this. Lean into it, matties." We must be giving someone a good laugh at base camp as three boats full of people desperately throw their weight around in an attempt to reengage our derailed rigs.
Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
********
Was it only last week when Julie, Nic, Tim, and Kelley concocted the brilliant idea to surprise the twins with a trip to Disneyland on their birthday? None of my grandkids have ever been to the park. Disney is not a thing with our family, but Tim, my son-in-law, works for ESPN, which Disney owns, and he and Kelley get free passes a few times a year to bring guests and guess what—those passes added up to exactly the number of people who could go on this last-minute "magical" adventure.
The announcement was rather epic. We were having a family dinner on our back patio with Larry's parents and our beloved neighbors Debbie and Ron. I'm not sure the girls really knew what it meant when we all shouted, "We're going to Disneyland," but they fed off of our excitement, as people usually do, and everyone seemed quite taken with the idea.
Then Uncle Dante handed the twins Disney sweatshirts, which he purchased in anticipation of the trip, and they complimented the general chaos quite nicely. Mouse ears appeared from nowhere, Audrey scored a cropped Mickey shirt, and with huge smiles, we returned to our cheeseburgers, pasta salad, and tatter tots.
The very next day, we piled into two separate cars and headed south, landing at the Tropicana Inn right across the street from the park. It's a classic two-story building with three wings of rooms surrounding a large pool and hot tub. It's a bit utilitarian but completely packed with overstimulated kids, exhausted parents, and minivans.
Kelley, Dante, Larry, and I arrived several hours before Julie's family, so we took advantage of our extra time and went into the park. Kelley and Dante led us around as if they were professional Disney tour guides, and we ended up in Star Wars land, fighting for the cause and enjoying a frothy cocktail at Olga's Cantina. Our surprise guest, Uncle Tim (the girls don't know he's coming), joined us for dinner in Downtown Disney.
While we were all walking back to the hotel, the Disney castle was illuminated in hues of silvery blues. In the night sky, fireworks were going off, exploding in the darkness and shooting long ribbons of color high into the blackened sky. It was spectacular.
Something inside of me shifts as I stand transfixed by the fireworks, and I finally realize this is the image I've held in my head of Disneyland for forty years. It was the beginning of the Wonderful World of Walt Disney TV show that garnered our full attention every Sunday night for at least a decade. I know it sounds crazy, but part of me wants to feel that way again.
You know what I mean?
That evocative sense of safety I felt snuggled on the couch with Mom and Dad in our little house on Strawberry Park Drive, and honestly, I think I've somehow associated this image with heaven.
Maybe that's what I'm doing with this entire trip —I'm looking for that thing I remember deep in the crevice of my soul.
Home, be it this one or the next.
Early the next morning, we met the entire family at IHOP for a hearty breakfast. In my opinion, it's really just an elevated Denny's where strawberries and whipped cream are excessively used with every entree.
Walking into the park for the first time with my granddaughters is surreal because I'm searching their faces for an intimation of my own experience. Leslie Le Mon says Main Street is a representation of the American creation tale, and the kick is that the American origin story is a never-ending one, a perpetual tale of creation, an eternal now.
I mimic their oohs and awes as they take it all in with big, wide eyes, and the chills you get when something remembered collides with the present moment travels down my arms.
We thought it would be best to start with a simple and fun ride. And what could be simpler and more fun than Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs?
The wicked witch, that's who, and when she starts cackling like a hyena while poisoning Snow White's apple, the twins go into a full panic and scream bloody murder. I had my arms around both of them, trying to ease their fears, but it wasn't until Prince Charming rode in on his white horse and kissed the comatose girl that their sanity was restored. Isn't there a Disney princess who solves her own problems without having to depend on a man?
No, that's not realistic.
Yes, I'm being sarcastic.
Although Walt Disney himself said this about the naive and moody Cinderella, "She believed in dreams, all right, but she also believed in doing something about them. When Prince Charming didn't come along, she went over to the palace and got him." I get it.
So, after traumatizing the kids with Snow White, we marched over to Frontier Land and jumped in line for the Indiana Jones ride.
What the hell were we thinking?
Larry was the driver, and all ten of us were in the same gigantic jeep. That was an epic fail. The car flew around as if fueled by a rocket. There was an invasion of cockroaches and snakes, unexpected bursts of wind, bridges that collapsed as you drove over them, spontaneous explosions, and at the end of the ride, a huge boulder almost crushed us to smithereens. We thought poisoning an apple was terrifying? The girls are now traumatized for life.
To make matters worse, we decided to hop on the Pirates of the Caribbean, singing, "Yo, ho, yo, ho, the pirate's life for me," as we scampered along an endless maze before getting to the actual ride. The ten of us board this innocent-looking plastic boat with five rows of bright yellow seats and willingly float into a deep, dark cave. Somehow three boats in a row spontaneously derail right in front of a gigantic mechanical pirate who offers a deadly warning over and over again, like the recording I get when my kids don't answer their phones.
After rocking the boat repeatedly with our own body weight, I don't know how, but we managed to get all the boats back on the track. The lady with the elevated voice applauds us over the loudspeaker, the big doors open, and we immediately go slamming down a waterfall, getting soaked in the process. The adults are all on high alert as if the boat might go flying off the rails and into one of the sets at any moment. This is what I call barely contained chaos.
Isn't that always the way in life, you make a decision, and just when you have no way of turning around, you're on a one-way street, so to speak, connected to a damn track, and someone decides, at this very moment, a dire warning is called for.
Jumping on the jungle cruise to calm everyone down was the first good decision we've made all day, and that did the trick. But it's only 10:00 a.m., and I'm completely exhausted. Am I getting old, or what?
We joined the Disney rat race: running around the park as if we were all on an important mission, scanning our phones for wait times for the next ride. But by the time we'd get everyone all the way across the park, the wait time would somehow double, or the ride would suddenly close for repairs.
On a more positive note, the landscaping is extraordinary; each land is so intricate that you feel as if you have been transported to another world just by crossing a bridge or passing through a castle. The kids were captivated by a thousand different things that sent their imaginations soaring. This I believe is the magic of Disneyland.
Here's a worthy suggestion when everyone needs a break: There are never any lines at It's A Small World, but you do have to board a boat and enter a dark tunnel. This seems to be a popular theme in the park. We zig-zagged through a politically incorrect world of singing dolls, and now I can't get that blasted song out of my head.
Of course, we had to ride the famous submarines so we could look for Nemo (a huge hit with everyone but the claustrophobics), climb to the top of the Swiss Family Robinson's tree house, and check out Mickey's crib in Tune Town.
By 1:00 p.m., the park was extremely crowded, so we decided it was time for lunch, some adult beverages, and a place to sit for a while. All the girls wanted to do was go back to the hotel and swim. Julie wanted them to have the full Disney experience and was adamant about staying in the park.
Smile, Damn It. We're at the happiest place on earth.
Lunch was a good call. All of our sugar levels returned to normal, the adult beverages started kicking in, and we were ready for Disneyland Part Two.
Okay, this is what really went down.
All of our adult kids abandoned us for the new Star Wars land, leaving Larry and me with the three darling girls who wanted to drive their own cars in Utopia. After 45 minutes of waiting in line, I jumped in a little roadster with Sienna, Larry in a red convertible with Cora, and poor Audrey was alone in the car between us. But she really couldn't reach the pedals and drive at the same time, and we were holding up the entire ride. Thank God those cars don't have horns. A kind employee jumped in with Audrey and cleared up the traffic jam. There's a reason you need to be sixteen to drive.
Reaching the pedals is one of them.
We eventually reunited with the kids, who wanted to show the girls the Star Wars land. The kiddos somehow convinced us that they would love to go on the Star Wars ride. I was unsure, but they boarded a futuristic transport, fought for the rebel cause, and now they're claiming it as their favorite ride.
Who knew?
We finished off the day with a ride on the infamous Merry-Go-Round while Dante and Larry walked to the nearest pizza parlor and ordered four large pizzas to eat around the pool back at the hotel. That was a hit. On the way back to the Tropicana, I passed a market that sold beer and wine. We grabbed the plastic cups from our room and enjoyed a relaxing dinner by the pool while the girls swam.
Walt Disney said, "Goodbye may seem forever. Farewell is like the end, but in my heart is the memory, and there you will always be." In my heart, I feel all those old memories merging with the new ones as if the child, the parent, and the grandmother, once separate beings, has coalesced into a new creation.
I've been trying to figure out where this obsession with Disneyland comes from, and I think I figured it out. It might be the perfect answer to our modern dilemma of obsessive busyness.
Disneyland is a nostalgic place for many of us who are now parents or grandparents; some consider it sacred, and I think the recidivism rate is high because no one will judge you for skipping down the street in the middle of the day, wearing mouse ears, and eating cotton candy. It's okay to let your guard down, take a risk, rediscover your own childhood, laugh, scream, play, and enjoy intimate time with the family.
There's a force in the world that is designed to stifle our sense of wonder and creativity as we age; it's called adulting. The secret to staying young is to stay curious and in a state of play, and Disneyland is the ultimate playground for adults and kids alike. I think it was that famous Nazarene who said, "Those who remain childlike will be celebrated in the next life."
This is a powerful opportunity in a world that allows stressful jobs, the demands of a household, student obligations, and the isolating effects of technology to delineate the family.
So where does your magic happen?
Like Walt Disney, I believe we can make our dreams come true through the power of our imagination. Whatever your passion might be, your hopes for the future—the muscle we stretch, reshape, and depend on is the imagination—well, that and the things we carry in our hearts and likely on our phones. Disneyland fuels our imaginations by allowing us to enter a timeless land of enchantment, one that is always changing and never-ending. Now isn't that just the perfect slice of heaven.
I'm Living in the Gap, playing with the idea of childlike creativity, love to hear your thoughts.
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