Topic: Children and Disney

I've mentioned it before, from what I've seen Disney's theme parks are fantastic, but the real way to experience them is through a child. If you went as a child you got to experience it this way. Vicariously, I watched kids from around the world oooh and aaaah over Cinderella, Goofy, Genie. I too, would get caught up and get excited to see Chip and Dale.

But it wasn't always sunshine and flowers. AAP wrote about one incident where a parent wanted to leave their child in their stroller (unattended) while she went on a ride. I saw parents loose their cool at the Happiest Place on Earth; one father yanked his child so hard the kid fell. The father continued to pull his son toward him along the cement walkway. The kid didn't get to his feet until he was at his father's side. Excitement, stress and stimuli all contribute to raised tempers and short attention spans.

Still, kids will be kids and parents will be aged kids, too. Two particular incidences poke out at me. Allow me to set the scene.

The first event (chronologically) occured at the Disney-MGM Studio park inside the Aerosmith ride. Of course there are lines and of course there are long waits. (It was a cool ride.) Directly in front of me were some teenagers. And in front of them was a family. The youngest boy (about 7 years old) of that family kept straying from his family. The mother seemed particularly unconcerned, probably because he always made his way back to her.

So, for the 20 min. or so leading up to this moment I'm about to describe to you, we would pass by him and eventually he would dodge around us and the teenagers, to get back to his family. Almost tripping over him a couple of times gave me the sense we knew each other.

In this darkened room with loud-ish Aerosmith music we again came upon the little boy. Again, I almost tripped over him. At first, it looked like he was just hanging onto the railing watching people getting into the cars for the ride, but upon a closer look I saw that his head was at an angle and his mouth and toungue were wrapped around the vertical part of the railing.

A little shocked I asked him, "Are you licking that?!"

He looked up at me, startled and caught. He looked confused but inside his brain something must've told him he had a job to do because he hurriedly turned back to the post, dragged his tongue down to the base of the pole then back up to the top on the side he hadn't finished. I sputtered, amazed, "Are you licking the rail?!" Then, with only a scared backward glance he rushed back to the other side of his mother.

Until we were seperated he kept looking at me suspiciously. And from then on I kept my hands off the rails.

The other event I want to set up, I didn't actually hear. AAP did, so really he should tell this story. Because I already had the Licking-Kid story he told me I could tell it. Magic Kingdom: our last day and our last park, it closed early for "Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party:" This meant if you paid an extra $30 (or so) you could stick around and see the characters in halloween costumes and if the kids were in costume they could trick-or-treat.

Because we didn't stick around, we, along with many, many more were heading out. Many children were dressed up. Tons of Disney characters, ninjas and ghosts, monsters and Oz characters. As we reached the exit we all saw super heroes. One in particular was Spiderman. The Spiderman in question was apparently dragging his feet. Spiderman's mother said within hearing of AAP, "Some super hero. You're already tired."