I was thinking about why I feel the way I do about Disneyland, & I believe it has to do with what it represents to me. When our family went on vacations when I was but a wee lad, it was to Disneyland. And this was back in the day when you had to pay an entrance fee, then had to buy tickets in order to get onto the rides, A-E, with “E” tickets being the really cool rides, like the Matterhorn & later on, Space Mountain, & the “A” tickets being the waste of time rides, like “Small World.”
Disneyland meant Mickey Mouse pancakes, at the River Belle, which tasted so much better than any other pancakes because they had ears. It meant “Pirates of the Caribbean” 10 times. It meant ice-cream at day’s end. It meant buying one of those “Lollipop Guild” lollies that you know you’re never, ever going to be able to finish. It meant getting so tired that I couldn’t even keep eyes open, no matter how hard I tried. It meant dragging myself out of the park, 1 hour after closing, trying to make it all the way to the hotel across the street from the park. It meant family, all together – the good, the bad, the happy, the sad, the fighting with siblings, the sheer joy of the shared experience.
My kids currently don’t appreciate Disneyland in the same way (or at the same level of fervor,) that I do, but I’m betting that will change as time goes by… if not for the sake of Disney as the king of all commercial opportunities, but for the time that it means is spent together. It might seem like a waste of time, resources, money, & all kinds of other prudent sounding things, but I think going to Disneyland is worth it. And maybe we’ll go around Christmas again.
It could happen…
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