I love Disneyland. I was brainwashed at a very early age. Growing up in Southern California, Disneyland was a yearly event with Girl Scouts, friends, school. I’ve seen the meaning of e-ticket morph from meaning entry onto the exciting rides at Disneyland to meaning something you download from the internet.
Son had the opportunity to play at Disneyland with his Jr. High School Band. This is the highlight of the year (part of his indoctrination of the Disney cult experience) with much planning, rehearsing and fundraising. I volunteered to be a chaperone and was one chosen to go with the band behind the scenes to get dressed and prepared for the show.
Walking into the backstage in Toon Town is like peeking behind the curtain – if I can mix my stories. It’s all the workings that make Disneyland the magical place it is. We were instructed to put our cameras away. There would be no sharing of what was behind this curtain. Props, trash cans, people smoking on breaks, workers carrying stuff around, not the pretty fantasy.
While we were waiting in an alley behind a food area, a huge cockroach was in the middle of the walk way. Huge. You could tell he was fearless, no one was going to mess with him, he had Disney food to eat and plenty of sunshine coming his way. Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay. Ah to be such a cockroach.
This made a lasting impression because this event happened last year. We went back to Disneyland this past weekend to do another performance. I mentioned the cockroach to a chaperone that had been on the trip last year. He too had just been thinking of that cockroach. Maybe it is just the contrast of the large happy cockroach basking in the sun and the fact that this was at the squeakiest clean image place on earth that made such an impact. But we couldn’t take a picture, because we were behind the scenes. The rule-makers knew what they were doing: preserving the magic. No need for pesky reality. Disney sells fantasy. I know I buy it.