The Inevitable Hysterics After a Trip to The Magic Place

Where did that curb come from?

This thought occurred simultaneously with the bad sound of suspension and tires and concrete and lots of things that probably aren’t supposed to be mixed together. The lighting in the intersection was poor and therefore hid the curb from being immediately obvious as I made my turn. Despite the bad lighting, the increasingly distant black shine of my husband’s new car was still visible up ahead.

I blinked at the dash. Some new, previously unseen light was going to turn on, I just knew it. I blinked at it while I sat at the next red light.

At any moment.

That shiny new car way up ahead was probably still swerving about, awkwardly approaching the thickly painted yellow lines of the street, testing out all the new technology the beast had been built with. And therefore his last minute decision to swerve before he hit the aforementioned curb was disregarded by me, as I followed behind. Just another swerve of a man intoxicated by new technology, I had thought.

The darkness of midnight was hanging over the city, which was quieter than most cities at that hour, because its main populace—the tourist—had spent twelve hours walking around in The Magic Place. Twelve hours in The Magic Place is enough to send anyone into any sort of awkward hotel bed for a prolonged time, but not us. We were troopers. Troopers that had to work in the morning. I looked back at the dash.

Any moment now.

Any Moment Then, Twelve Hours Before

I always want to hate The Magic Place. I really want to. So many people make so many stupid Facebook photos there. They want to seem like they are perfect families, because of course the most perfect place to go is The Magic Place. Despite this, free tickets were held out to me from kind friends, and naturally children just love magic, so we had to take our children there.

I want to hate The Magic Place, but it can’t be done. Everyone has fun at Disney World. If you happened to not have fun, which is as stated extremely unlikely, I think Mickey Mouse might jump out of the gates upon your exiting and pull you back in for a second try. Nobody leaves unhappy, or is it that nobody unhappy leaves?

Upon contemplating a trip to The Magic Place, a sparkle came to my husband’s eye. Not because he really likes hunting down kiosks to get fast paces, or because he secretly has a thing for Daisy Duck (at least not that I know of anyway), but because of the car.

There are a lot of good car deals down there by The Magic Place, and the man has had a bit of a vehicular roving eye for some time now. It was as though fate had announced that now was the time to pick one of those fine, shiny metallic ladies, and make a commitment. And so a car was purchased, and the Disney adventure began.

There is something a bit odd about how happy everyone is at Disney. I was driving a double-seater umbrella stroller with a mind of its own through large crowds, and uncontrollably running people’s feet over left and right. Nobody complained. People practically apologized for inconveniently taking up my needed space.

At the end of the fun day there was the inevitable fireworks show. We decided to leave right after, which would be soon, because they do fireworks every night—how spectacular could the show really be?

Never Underestimate Disney

Shortly after this truly Disney-style show of grandeur began, we became aware that somehow the one and only redneck in the entire World of Disney had managed to settle himself immediately behind us.

“We do this in our backyard! It’s like the fourth of July around here!” The redneck's voice bellowed. This was followed up by a particularly obnoxious laugh with a husky sound to it. The sort of sound long-term smokers have, because their voice boxes have gone rusty.

And then the man whistled. It was one of those finger whistles—the sort people do in stadiums. Only usually they are just kind of loud, so that people across the way notice. But this man clearly had a talent. Despite his rusty voice box that man let out the most shatteringly loud finger whistle known to exist. It was world record breaking. It was ear drum breaking. It was a fight-the-urge-to-turn-around-and-punch-him-in-the-face sort of loud.

But I didn’t. And neither did my husband, or anyone else around me, because we were at Disney. People are just freakishly happy at Disney World.

But Back To Any Moment Now

Things were less happy then. My husband’s distant tail lights were somewhere up there, into the blackness. My phone was acting funny and didn’t seem to want to place a call or function as my GPS, so I whipped out the old girl—the GPS of ten years ago that sleeps languidly in the consol. She likes to randomly tell me to reroute because of “construction,” which likely was completed ten years ago.

It was after midnight, with a long drive ahead, two children sleeping in the backseat, an antiquated GPS for a leader, traveling in a possibly dysfunctional vehicle at a speed of 75 mph. What could possibly go wrong?

That was when I started laughing. There is this strange thing that happens to me when I am very tired: everything distressing becomes funny. It is like emotional processing goes a little haywire in the brain when deprived of sleep. I can’t even blame Disney mojo on having seeped into my body, because I’m like this normally.

The Disney mojo did work on the kids, really. Really, it did.

It was then that the service to my phone suddenly kicked back in and the dash lit up with my husband’s name.

“I’m waiting for a tire to go flat or a wheel to start rattling or something that is going to cause me to have to pull onto the shoulder and put our lives at the mercy of all these maniac drivers or some backwoods ax murderer,” I struggled to get the words out between burst of laughter.

“Any moment now.”