I’m having a devil of a time trying to write about my recent adventure. I find this odd because it was a great adventure – my whole family (three kids, their spouses and four grandchildren) went for a nine day vacation to one of the happiest places on earth – Disney’s Magic Kingdom – and I can’t find the words to write about it. The weather was great and all the people I wished were there were there – except for one. Perhaps it’s that ‘one’ giving me pause.
I had been planning this trip for months; some of the crew had to book time off work, others had to secure caretakers for dogs and then ALL of the adults had to keep the giant secret from three little girls so they could be surprised for Christmas. I’d saved money from selling our family home and wanted the kids to have one last family adventure on us – the ‘us’ who built the family, the ‘us’ who made that house a home, the ‘us’ who had been so keen on adventures with our kids. I wanted that ‘us’ to do this.
Our children were two, four and six years old the first time we took them to Disneyland. We went on a shoestring – just a couple of young parents working the magic for their little kids. We had no idea we were setting the stage for what would become a lifelong addiction. I found the fountain of youth in Disneyland, its magic hit my heart like Christmas morning, I couldn’t get enough of it. Watching my children ‘believe’ was an elixir – their sparkle was my pixie dust.
We visited the Kingdom every other year until the magic began to wane, the kids still loved the land but they didn’t ‘believe’ anymore. The magic I’d felt in my heart started to feel like something else as our teenagers raced down main street USA and turned just before the castle – Fantasy Land was only visited for nostalgia’s sake, they were off to bigger things in Tomorrow and Adventure Land. We still had fun – while the kids rode roller-coasters my husband and I walked down memory lane – every corner of the land held a piece of remembered magic. Then one year even the remembered magic began to fade and we realized if we tried to recapture it it would die. We had to let it go – our kids had grown up.
For the sake of this story we will fast forward over a dozen years and re-introduce the magic with the addition of grandchildren into our lives. The seeds of Disney adventure planted in the past had taken root in our now adult children – they too wanted to sow the magic. One of our kids in particular drank the elixir like her mother – she was as goofy on Mickey as I was. We were back in business.
We visited the Magic Kingdom three times with those little people before we lost the captain of our ship. Three times we entered the worlds of yesterday, tomorrow and fantasy. Three times we watched fireworks light up the night sky. Three times the magic became pixie dust again. And then everything changed, the light dimmed and I packed the magic away.
But here we are – home from a Disney adventure we took without him. It took a lot of courage to set the magic loose again – I had to pull on my big girl pants, hold my breath and let go. The trip felt like a good idea in the planning stages, the excitement was real, the anticipation palpable. The intent was there, the plan to be present while I navigated the magic kingdom without him, to revel in the moment, to show our grandchildren how to do Disney like a boss and to do all this without looking over my shoulder, without pining for the past. It was a tall order…. too tall.
I’ve just spent nine days walking with a ghost – it was heartbreaking and wonderful in the same breath. Now that we’re home I realize that I was supposed to look over my shoulder as we wandered through the land, supposed to revisit all those happy times. I was supposed to stand in the spot where he stood to wave at us while Dumbo took his magical flight, the spot where he snapped the pictures of us riding Carousel horses around an endless loop. I was supposed to witness the magic turning into pixie dust on the faces of our grandchildren. It was my turn to be the watcher.
The magic was different without him there but there was still magic- I needed to spend a little time walking with his ghost, watching from a different vantage. I needed to discover that I’m alone only in the physical sense – he is part of me. Where the magic was pixie dust to me that pixie dust was magic to him. I realized while I was walking and watching that he had spent his life making the world magical for me and he had just done it again.
