While newer movies like "Zootopia" and "Moana" earn raves from the public (and many critics), many of the older Disney features are falling out of favor. "Disney princesses are terrible examples for children!" I hear. "They're weak and passive and waiting for someone to save them! And they think that marrying a prince is their life's goal!"
I disagree; that's not what I see happening.
On the other hand Disney also takes heat for sanitizing the stories. Why is that even a criticism? Do we want the Brothers Grimm versions, where, for instance, the prince is so taken by the lady experiencing enchanted slumber that he has sexual relations with her while she's unconscious, and she wakes up to find herself a mother of three? Did anybody seriously like the original Andersen version of "The Little Mermaid" where the prince rejects her, and she's content to be turned into seafoam and lap at the base of his castle? Seriously, I can't imagine preferring those versions, even if they are the original source material.
I think, as well, that the critics aren't actually watching the movies, just repeating previous complaints. I don't see the problems they insist exist.
Let's take Cinderella, the original animated version; she catches a lot of flack. "She just waits to be rescued! She lets other people treat her badly! Why doesn't she just leave?"
First, let's address the idea that the victims of abuse are somehow responsible, because they don't leave. They just "take it." I could spend pages - volumes, even - citing research about the effects that abuse has, the complex psychological issues, the fact that leaving is the most dangerous and deadly time, the fact that it is never the fault of the victim, but let's just settle on the latter - never the fault of the victim - and move on.
Mostly, I'm touching only briefly on those issues because, although they are very valid and the conversation could stop there, when I watch Cinderella, she doesn't behave as though she's damaged.
I want to start with the late 20th/early 21st century assumption that Cinderella should just walk out, get a university degree, and open a fashionable boutique or become a women's advocate attorney. We should all be conversant enough in history to know that it was not physically possible for Cinderella, or anyone else, to be a "strong, independent woman who don't need no man." A woman could live three basic places - her father's home, her husband's home, or a convent. That's it. There was no avenue to being a single, self supporting woman. Cinderella knew that she had, basically, two choices - live in the family home, or become a servant in someone else's home. She already had the tasks of a servant, so she chose - actively chose - to stay in the family home, rather than performing those tasks somewhere else.
Why? Because she wasn't about to let someone run her out of her own home, the one where she was born. Because she had the advantage of "the devil you know." Because the home held happy memories of her loved ones, as well as their physical belongings. Because she knew, having lost both of her parents, that parents die; she therefore knew that, chances were, her stepmother would pass one day, and the home would again be hers alone. She could wait it out.
Which brings us to another admirable trait, one we should all cultivate - she did not let her circumstances, or the opinions of others, determine her self worth. No matter how she was treated, or how often someone told her that she was worthless, she never felt that way.
She didn't start to droop and wince like a kicked puppy. She did not pine and suffer and ask, "Why are you doing this? Why don't you love me?" She did not lash out and become spiteful, spitting in their food. She knew that how people treat you reflects on them, and how you treat people reflects your character. She was calm and competent, no matter what the others around her might say or do. Do you know how hard it is to find and live that balance? She did it apparently effortlessly.
She befriended those that others overlooked, those who, in theory, can do nothing to benefit her. She doesn't feel sorry for herself - she's grateful for what she has, and doesn't consider it a second best substitute that she jetisons as soon as her circumstances change. And, guess what happens? They find a way to help her.
She was not looking for someone to rescue her. She didn't complain. She wanted a night out, not deliverance. She wasn't looking to get spirited away, or to find a husband. She wanted to attend a party. She didn't want to be the prettiest one at the ball, or to have men court her. She just wanted to be well enough dressed that they'd let her in.
Something people seem to forget, too - when she danced all night with a handsome man, she didn't know that he was the prince. He could have been the cook or the gardener or a distant cousin of the prince. She didn't care. When she makes her excuses to leave, she says, "I haven't met the prince," and he's surprised. "Didn't you know?" he asks.
When she hears that he's looking for her, she finally admits to herself that she wants to see him again. He was not the point of the evening; meeting him was a happy side benefit.
And, let's talk for a minute about the Fairy Godmother. She doesn't swoop in to alleviate or reduce difficulty. She doesn't take away problems. She just makes a night out possible. That speaks to me, as well. That's the way the universe works. Whatever you believe is the highest power - God, karma, whatever - does not make it so that you will never be unhappy, lonely, mistreated. It just helps you hang in there and bear the adversity that every life has. Then, when something good happens, it's not because you were helpless, and someone swooped in. It's because that's how life works, too. There is always beauty and happiness to be found, and you'd miss it if someone micromanaged your life for you; you'd be unable to distinguish it. Experience is what gives you perspective.
I'm a bit miffed, too, at criticism that her "happily ever after" includes getting married. Ask any person in a happy relationship if their relationship is one of the most important, most cherished things in their life, and they'll say "yes." Heck, a significant number of people in unhappy relationships would still say "yes." So, why would you criticize someone for wanting something that's important to you? She doesn't "define herself" by her marital status. She's just glad to have what most people want.
And once she gets the chance to leave the house with her tormentors in it, and craft the life she wants, she does not do any of the following: complain that getting there took too long, insist on revenge, gloat, punish those who did her wrong, insist on telling the story over and over so that "people know the truth." She just walks away. (And she takes her friends with her.)
I'll take those life lessons, for children or adults, any day.
Showing posts with label Disney. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Disney. Show all posts
Monday, October 16, 2017
Friday, June 27, 2014
The Pirate Bathroom
"I'm going to decorate my downstairs bathroom in a Pirates of the Caribbean theme," I said.
There was silence on the other end of the phone. Then my daughter said, with hesitation, "You're kidding... right?"
My oldest daughter is stylish, chic, elegant, appearance conscious - all adjectives that do not apply to me. Her home is tasteful and coordinated, with mostly new furnishings. My downstairs bathroom has been out of commission for years, and the idea of having it redone delighted her, but the idea that her mother, a grown woman, would deliberately choose a theme park ride as decorating inspiration did not sit well with her.
"No, I'm not! I'm serious! It'll be great! I'm already shopping at thrift stores for decorations!"
"Oh, Mom."
This bathroom is now my favorite room in the house. It makes me very happy.
(It is also a point of pride with me that Pirates was one of my favorite rides going back to the early 1980s. While it's fun that pop culture is embracing them, some of us loved the whole idea before it was cool.)
Our house was built in the early 1970s. It originally had 2 bathrooms, one downstairs and one upstairs. The original owners added onto the house, so we now have, among other things, a 3rd full bathroom off of the master bedroom.
A few years after we moved in, the downstairs toilet started to leak, so we stopped using it. Then the sink leaked; we stopped using it. Finally, the tub started to leak. We just closed the door and ignored the room for years. Hey, we had two more full bathrooms. We had limited money and a house full of children. Don't judge.
Eventually, we started tearing things out. We did it bit by bit until we hit a real stumbling block - the tub. It was a cast iron tub/shower enclosure. It had been set into place before the walls were built, and it was too large to fit through the doorway. We were stumped - how did we replace a tub that we couldn't remove? We closed the door again, and pretended that the room didn't exist for several more years.
Then, my feet needed operated on. OK, they'd needed it for a long time, but we finally had youngest children who were teens capable of taking care of themselves and me. When my doctor first suggested it, my oldest kids were in elementary school, and I had a one year old; bed rest was not going to happen. The younger kids were now also homeschooled, so we'd rarely need to leave the house while I spent the projected 4 to 6 weeks off of my feet.
But, that meant a working bathroom on my ground floor, since going up and down my stairs would be next to impossible while I recovered. We had to get the bathroom up and running before I could schedule surgery.
We finished demolition, including sawing the old tub and shower in half. Yeah, that was interesting. We tore out the water damaged drywall. Finally, we tore up the rotted, splitting floor. The room looked like this:
My husband intended to do most of the work himself, but between his 12 hour shifts and life in general, this was not a good plan. A friend helped us get to the point that we then hired a pro to install everything and finish the room. Instead of a tub, we went with a handicapped accessible shower.
God bless talented contractors!
I was in such a hurry to paint it. Of course, "hurry" is a relative term. My almost 15 year old had never used the bathroom. Then my husband installed the flooring.
Normally, I like white walls and white blinds, maybe with white curtains over them. I know, very institutional and bland. I like it anyway. It's restful. If I add colors, I want to add blue, any shade but navy, and other pale colors. My daughter's room is a pale pink and my son's is a pale gray. Both are so light that they're almost white. The upstairs bathroom is white with blue and green sponge paint, and an ocean theme, with my collection of beach sand in decorative jars (yes, I collect beach sand), shells, and a shower curtain with dolphins and palm trees.
Downstairs in the new bathroom, I went with a totally uncharacteristic color palate. I wanted amber, ruby and deep brown. I wanted it to look like it could belong below deck on a pirate ship, or in Disneyland. I wanted the feel of a storage room heaped with treasure.
I'm a competent stage technician in many jobs, but my area of expertise is set dressing and prop making. The last show that I got to "dress" was A Christmas Carol, and I loved it. When my kids have had proms to attend, I dress the photo backdrop in our bedroom studio to match the theme. I've done "Arabian Nights," "A Night to Treasure," "A Night at the Museum," "A Night in Paris" and more with things I have on hand anyway. I'd also been collecting things specifically for this bathroom for a long time. That ring of iron keys is one of my favorite purchases.
There's a lot of memories in here. The beads are from trips to Disneyland, Disney cruises, and my niece's 20s themed wedding. The ornate silver piece holding the coins and gems belonged to my mother. So did the silver goblet. The amethyst is from my rock and mineral collection; so are the onyx goblets and the marble globes. The egg shaped boxes were gifts from my oldest daughter. The jade elephant is a childhood gift from my brother. The shiny rock behind it is my sample of silicon that I used while teaching K-3 geology. The Egyptian figures were things I bought just because I liked them, and they ended up being used in my son's archaeological dig project for our homeschool co-op. I bought the carved parrot in Nassau.
I don't have a medicine cabinet, so I use the cute box.
I'm not a stickler for historical accuracy unless I have to be, so this room isn't a period piece. If it was, I wouldn't use my son's Lego set, or the photographs we took in the Disney ride. (Those are printed on metal, to keep the humidity of a bathroom from being an issue.) The print of a pirate ship was a gift from my middle daughter, as was the plaque with words on it. She used the metal trays when she catered a dessert buffet at a wedding.
I originally wanted an oval mirror with an ornate, gilt frame, but the mirror came in a set with the vanity and sink. I'm OK with it.
I love this bathroom. I love that it allowed me to get the operation that I needed, but I also love just looking at it.
A pirate's life for me.
There was silence on the other end of the phone. Then my daughter said, with hesitation, "You're kidding... right?"
My oldest daughter is stylish, chic, elegant, appearance conscious - all adjectives that do not apply to me. Her home is tasteful and coordinated, with mostly new furnishings. My downstairs bathroom has been out of commission for years, and the idea of having it redone delighted her, but the idea that her mother, a grown woman, would deliberately choose a theme park ride as decorating inspiration did not sit well with her.
"No, I'm not! I'm serious! It'll be great! I'm already shopping at thrift stores for decorations!"
"Oh, Mom."
This bathroom is now my favorite room in the house. It makes me very happy.
(It is also a point of pride with me that Pirates was one of my favorite rides going back to the early 1980s. While it's fun that pop culture is embracing them, some of us loved the whole idea before it was cool.)
Our house was built in the early 1970s. It originally had 2 bathrooms, one downstairs and one upstairs. The original owners added onto the house, so we now have, among other things, a 3rd full bathroom off of the master bedroom.
A few years after we moved in, the downstairs toilet started to leak, so we stopped using it. Then the sink leaked; we stopped using it. Finally, the tub started to leak. We just closed the door and ignored the room for years. Hey, we had two more full bathrooms. We had limited money and a house full of children. Don't judge.
Eventually, we started tearing things out. We did it bit by bit until we hit a real stumbling block - the tub. It was a cast iron tub/shower enclosure. It had been set into place before the walls were built, and it was too large to fit through the doorway. We were stumped - how did we replace a tub that we couldn't remove? We closed the door again, and pretended that the room didn't exist for several more years.
Then, my feet needed operated on. OK, they'd needed it for a long time, but we finally had youngest children who were teens capable of taking care of themselves and me. When my doctor first suggested it, my oldest kids were in elementary school, and I had a one year old; bed rest was not going to happen. The younger kids were now also homeschooled, so we'd rarely need to leave the house while I spent the projected 4 to 6 weeks off of my feet.
But, that meant a working bathroom on my ground floor, since going up and down my stairs would be next to impossible while I recovered. We had to get the bathroom up and running before I could schedule surgery.
We finished demolition, including sawing the old tub and shower in half. Yeah, that was interesting. We tore out the water damaged drywall. Finally, we tore up the rotted, splitting floor. The room looked like this:
My husband intended to do most of the work himself, but between his 12 hour shifts and life in general, this was not a good plan. A friend helped us get to the point that we then hired a pro to install everything and finish the room. Instead of a tub, we went with a handicapped accessible shower.
God bless talented contractors!
I was in such a hurry to paint it. Of course, "hurry" is a relative term. My almost 15 year old had never used the bathroom. Then my husband installed the flooring.
Normally, I like white walls and white blinds, maybe with white curtains over them. I know, very institutional and bland. I like it anyway. It's restful. If I add colors, I want to add blue, any shade but navy, and other pale colors. My daughter's room is a pale pink and my son's is a pale gray. Both are so light that they're almost white. The upstairs bathroom is white with blue and green sponge paint, and an ocean theme, with my collection of beach sand in decorative jars (yes, I collect beach sand), shells, and a shower curtain with dolphins and palm trees.
Downstairs in the new bathroom, I went with a totally uncharacteristic color palate. I wanted amber, ruby and deep brown. I wanted it to look like it could belong below deck on a pirate ship, or in Disneyland. I wanted the feel of a storage room heaped with treasure.
I'm a competent stage technician in many jobs, but my area of expertise is set dressing and prop making. The last show that I got to "dress" was A Christmas Carol, and I loved it. When my kids have had proms to attend, I dress the photo backdrop in our bedroom studio to match the theme. I've done "Arabian Nights," "A Night to Treasure," "A Night at the Museum," "A Night in Paris" and more with things I have on hand anyway. I'd also been collecting things specifically for this bathroom for a long time. That ring of iron keys is one of my favorite purchases.
There's a lot of memories in here. The beads are from trips to Disneyland, Disney cruises, and my niece's 20s themed wedding. The ornate silver piece holding the coins and gems belonged to my mother. So did the silver goblet. The amethyst is from my rock and mineral collection; so are the onyx goblets and the marble globes. The egg shaped boxes were gifts from my oldest daughter. The jade elephant is a childhood gift from my brother. The shiny rock behind it is my sample of silicon that I used while teaching K-3 geology. The Egyptian figures were things I bought just because I liked them, and they ended up being used in my son's archaeological dig project for our homeschool co-op. I bought the carved parrot in Nassau.
I don't have a medicine cabinet, so I use the cute box.
I'm not a stickler for historical accuracy unless I have to be, so this room isn't a period piece. If it was, I wouldn't use my son's Lego set, or the photographs we took in the Disney ride. (Those are printed on metal, to keep the humidity of a bathroom from being an issue.) The print of a pirate ship was a gift from my middle daughter, as was the plaque with words on it. She used the metal trays when she catered a dessert buffet at a wedding.
I originally wanted an oval mirror with an ornate, gilt frame, but the mirror came in a set with the vanity and sink. I'm OK with it.
I love this bathroom. I love that it allowed me to get the operation that I needed, but I also love just looking at it.
A pirate's life for me.
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Sailing the Seven Seas - Or At Least One
Did you ever wonder what it might have been like to sail with Columbus, to head out to sea with most people telling you that you'll sail off the edge of the earth or be eaten by monsters, but your own conviction tells you that you'll find a new route to known lands? Or what it would be like sail an outrigger canoe between Pacific islands with only the stars to guide you? Have you imagined what it must have been like for so many of our ancestors to leave the place of their birth, and board a ship to a new land, with no reason to believe that they'd ever return to the place of their birth? Or wondered what it would have been like to travel during the era of grand ocean liners, when the rich and famous sailed across oceans on ships with fine dining rooms and waiters in tuxedos?
Of course, I've wondered all those things. I wonder about them for all the usual reasons, and I wonder if I would have ever had the courage to attempt such a thing because water terrifies me. Crossing the American continent with a handcart sounds easier to me than sailing off across the sea.
As my family spent two weeks on a transatlantic ship recently, I told my son that I hoped that I'd gain a tiny bit of insight into what it had been like for travelers and explorers of centuries past.
His reply was succinct and characteristic. "Yeah, Mom. With the buffet and the pool, now you really understand Columbus."
Smart aleck.
On the one hand, he's completely right. We took our trip for entertainment. We knew exactly where we were going, and kept a schedule. Our ship bears little resemblance to most ships of years past, especially wooden sailing ships. We were well fed, comfortably housed, clean and climate controlled. Still, the most important consideration for me was not the vessel, the destination or the schedule; it was putting my life in the hands of the open ocean. It has swallowed so many of our ancestors, and so many ships - how could I trust it not to swallow ours? Even if it kept us alive, what guarantee did I have that it wouldn't keep us sick and/or terrified, the entire way?
I like guarantees. I will never, ever be a gambler.
The hardest part of the entire trip, for me, was making up my mind to go. It took me months to get to the point that I was OK with going - because, if I went, I had to be prepared for the worst case scenario. I had to have an actual, concrete plan for what I would do, and how I would feel, if I drowned in a shipwreck, or if it was nothing but storms all the way across. I have to be prepared.
I'm actually very good in a crisis - I become very calm, very efficient and very articulate - but I hate having things sprung on me with no warning, even good things. I must prepare.
How did people do it in years past, I wondered. How did they face the uncertainty? I have the luxury of living in a day when losses at sea are rare, and nowhere on the planet is uncharted. How did anyone ever look out at the ocean and say, "I'm not sure what's out there, but I'm going to go find out"? How did anyone decide to make any sea voyage when "lost at sea" was a common cause of death, and architectural features were named things like "widow's walk," because so many were used by actual widows? I don't think I could do it.
Even when I was on the other side of the ocean, standing at Europa Point, having had a safe crossing, I looked back out to the Atlantic and wondered how they did it. It seemed too scary.
Even men who loved the sea knew that she can turn on you in an instant, that she's merciless when angry. Then there were the maps marked, "Here, there be monsters." Forget about the water itself; underneath it were creatures who could, and did, swallow humans without blinking an eye.
As much as I'm a lifelong Star Trek fan, I used to think the same thing while watching the TV show - how did they head out INTO SPACE, knowing that they were surrounded by something that would kill them in an instant? Icy cold, zero atmosphere space is more frightening, and more deadly, than water. Much as I wanted to be a crew member on the Starship Enterprise, I wasn't sure that I could do it.
So, before we left for our 14 days at sea, I spent time imagining; how would it look, sound and feel to be caught in a storm? To have to board the lifeboats? I planned what I would say and do. People who don't prepare, I think, are the ones who degenerate into a**es and begin shoving and screaming. I got to the point that I could say, "Well, if we go down, it's been a good life, and the last thing I did was let my kid choose the graduation gift that he wanted." You have no idea how difficult it was to make peace with the idea of drowning.
Ironically, thinking about airplanes and spaceships made me feel better. I'm not afraid of air travel, and I thought about how hard it is to keep a plane in the air, relative to keeping a ship (or anything else) afloat. The Titanic had gone down "quickly," in "only" 2 1/2 hours; no airplane could fall for 2 1/2 hours. A small, slow water leak would give us days of safety, but any breach in the hull of an airplane at cruising altitude can be catastrophic. I thought about all those battle sequences in every Star Trek episode and movie - the ship herself, and most of her crew, survived. Even when things were bad, you just had to live through the moment, then the next and the next. Bite sized goals are good.
Sometimes, my family made it more difficult to be calm. My husband read, OUT LOUD, a review that someone had written about their voyage from Florida to Ireland. "We encountered 29 foot waves that lasted for days. The captain ordered us all to stay indoors and off the decks."
"Why would you read something like that to me? Do you want me to stay home? Because I will! Just say the word!" He could not understand why I was so shrill. I wonder sometimes if my loved ones have actually met me.
I hardly slept the night before we left. I nearly flew home halfway to our embarkation point. I walked onto the ship in tears. Sailing out of Galveston and away from land was tough - I watched the land get farther and farther away and thought, "Well, here we go. Too late to back out now."
As the sun went down that first night, all I could hear in my head was the voice of the elderly Rose in the movie "Titanic" saying, "That was the last time the Titanic ever saw daylight."
When I told my son, he said, "Why would you even think that?" Well, welcome to my brain.
On the other hand, I had to practice, and I got very good at, living in the moment. I like to plan, I like to reminisce. I'm not very good at being in the moment. I had to learn to shut off the parts of my brain that wanted to play footage of sunken ships, sinking ships, trapped humans, waves, disaster... if I let it run, for even a minute, it would undermine weeks of work. So, I had to forcibly turn off the projector, as it were, every time it wanted to start up. I also had to enjoy every moment while it was happening - "Right now, I am safe. Right now, my kids are safe. Right now, we're having fun. Right now, life is pretty good."
And it was good. The sea was calm, and the ship was full of delightful things to do. I wasn't seasick at all, and I'm prone to motion sickness. My family was having a great time. I was having a great time.
I knew on the first morning aboard that I'd be OK. My son's alarm, on his phone, was set to something that sounded like an air raid siren from WW II. It was still set to go off at o'dark thirty, in another time zone, so that we could make it to the airport. It went off in the early hours of the morning, and I woke up sure that it was the ship's emergency signal. I started calmly running through the list in my head - put on warm clothes, get life vests from closet, head to Deck 4 - before he shut it off and I realized that it was the phone. It says something about how calm I was that I was able to fall immediately back to sleep.
There were still a few things that I worried about. I'd been afraid that waking up in the dark, in our inside cabin, would undo me, with the combination of dark and the feel of the waves. It didn't - it didn't bother me at all. Score one for me.
We spent three days in the Gulf of Mexico, and the water was calm. I worried about heading out into the Atlantic, though. Two places on the ship showed a "you are here" video screen, with a satellite view of our route and a little yellow arrow indicating our current position. The photo, of course, showed the different shades of water, indicating depth. After a stop in the Bahamas, we headed almost immediately over a defined line where sheltered, turquoise water turned into open, almost black water. Crossing that line made me very nervous. As we sailed away from our Bahamas stop, a storm was brewing - dark clouds rolled in, wind blew and rain began to fall.
Worse, you could sense the difference in the water almost instantly. After four days on the ship, it was now creaking. I know, of course, that the creaking is actually good; the ship had to react to water the way that buildings and bridges react to wind. There has to be give. Still, it was slightly unnerving.
The waves got bigger immediately. My husband and son seemed surprised by this. "I'm amazed. Do you know how much energy it takes to cause that? You'd think it would be flat."
No! No! I wouldn't think that it would be flat! It's the freakin' Atlantic Ocean! Had they never read any history, never seen any movies? Did they have no idea at all what the reputation of this ocean was? Did they think that it was only dangerous centuries ago, but it had somehow magically calmed down now that we technically savvy modern humans occupied the planet, that our "advances" somehow tamed the planet itself? Of course the waves were bigger! Of course it was stormy! How could they possibly have imagined that it would be otherwise? I said as much, and more; they looked at me as though I was some kind of experiment gone wrong.
That night was the hardest one so far. I knew that if I had to get into the lifeboats in that weather, especially in the dark, I would not handle it gracefully. At best, I would vomit and whimper. At worst, I would have a heart attack before I was ever loaded into the lifeboat. Still, there were no panic attacks, no tears, and I slept well. That was huge.
I'd also worried about the midpoint on the journey. Being dead center of the ocean, hours away from any help, sounded scary. The day came and went without me experiencing any anxiety at all. Wow, I thought. I got this!
Most of the time, the weather was gorgeous. Even the cruise director remarked, night after night, "Can you believe this weather? This isn't a typical Atlantic crossing." ("Your mother is so watching out for you!" my husband said. Thanks, Mom!)
We had one day of bad weather, so bad that the crew had to empty the pools, and the captain announced over the loudspeaker, "The ship is in no danger."
By then, day 10, I was rock solid. The only thing that annoyed me was the seasickness. I had to spend most of the day on deck, in the fresh air, and I felt it the exact moment the wind started to calm down. Even sliding back and forth on the bed while I was falling asleep didn't bother me.
By the time we had to leave the ship, I missed it terribly. We're already wondering when we can take another cruise. My husband keeps talking about taking another transatlantic cruise, going in the opposite direction this time, so that we gain an hour every time we cross a time zone. I do worry that, if we did it again, there would be more bad weather. I don't know how I feel about that possibility.
Do I understand those ancestors and explorers better now? Maybe a little. (Even though I had the buffet and the pool.)
I do know that I'm very proud of myself. I took on the fear, and I stared it down.
And I had a great time doing it.
Of course, I've wondered all those things. I wonder about them for all the usual reasons, and I wonder if I would have ever had the courage to attempt such a thing because water terrifies me. Crossing the American continent with a handcart sounds easier to me than sailing off across the sea.
As my family spent two weeks on a transatlantic ship recently, I told my son that I hoped that I'd gain a tiny bit of insight into what it had been like for travelers and explorers of centuries past.
His reply was succinct and characteristic. "Yeah, Mom. With the buffet and the pool, now you really understand Columbus."
Smart aleck.
On the one hand, he's completely right. We took our trip for entertainment. We knew exactly where we were going, and kept a schedule. Our ship bears little resemblance to most ships of years past, especially wooden sailing ships. We were well fed, comfortably housed, clean and climate controlled. Still, the most important consideration for me was not the vessel, the destination or the schedule; it was putting my life in the hands of the open ocean. It has swallowed so many of our ancestors, and so many ships - how could I trust it not to swallow ours? Even if it kept us alive, what guarantee did I have that it wouldn't keep us sick and/or terrified, the entire way?
I like guarantees. I will never, ever be a gambler.
The hardest part of the entire trip, for me, was making up my mind to go. It took me months to get to the point that I was OK with going - because, if I went, I had to be prepared for the worst case scenario. I had to have an actual, concrete plan for what I would do, and how I would feel, if I drowned in a shipwreck, or if it was nothing but storms all the way across. I have to be prepared.
I'm actually very good in a crisis - I become very calm, very efficient and very articulate - but I hate having things sprung on me with no warning, even good things. I must prepare.
How did people do it in years past, I wondered. How did they face the uncertainty? I have the luxury of living in a day when losses at sea are rare, and nowhere on the planet is uncharted. How did anyone ever look out at the ocean and say, "I'm not sure what's out there, but I'm going to go find out"? How did anyone decide to make any sea voyage when "lost at sea" was a common cause of death, and architectural features were named things like "widow's walk," because so many were used by actual widows? I don't think I could do it.
Even when I was on the other side of the ocean, standing at Europa Point, having had a safe crossing, I looked back out to the Atlantic and wondered how they did it. It seemed too scary.
Even men who loved the sea knew that she can turn on you in an instant, that she's merciless when angry. Then there were the maps marked, "Here, there be monsters." Forget about the water itself; underneath it were creatures who could, and did, swallow humans without blinking an eye.
As much as I'm a lifelong Star Trek fan, I used to think the same thing while watching the TV show - how did they head out INTO SPACE, knowing that they were surrounded by something that would kill them in an instant? Icy cold, zero atmosphere space is more frightening, and more deadly, than water. Much as I wanted to be a crew member on the Starship Enterprise, I wasn't sure that I could do it.
So, before we left for our 14 days at sea, I spent time imagining; how would it look, sound and feel to be caught in a storm? To have to board the lifeboats? I planned what I would say and do. People who don't prepare, I think, are the ones who degenerate into a**es and begin shoving and screaming. I got to the point that I could say, "Well, if we go down, it's been a good life, and the last thing I did was let my kid choose the graduation gift that he wanted." You have no idea how difficult it was to make peace with the idea of drowning.
Ironically, thinking about airplanes and spaceships made me feel better. I'm not afraid of air travel, and I thought about how hard it is to keep a plane in the air, relative to keeping a ship (or anything else) afloat. The Titanic had gone down "quickly," in "only" 2 1/2 hours; no airplane could fall for 2 1/2 hours. A small, slow water leak would give us days of safety, but any breach in the hull of an airplane at cruising altitude can be catastrophic. I thought about all those battle sequences in every Star Trek episode and movie - the ship herself, and most of her crew, survived. Even when things were bad, you just had to live through the moment, then the next and the next. Bite sized goals are good.
Sometimes, my family made it more difficult to be calm. My husband read, OUT LOUD, a review that someone had written about their voyage from Florida to Ireland. "We encountered 29 foot waves that lasted for days. The captain ordered us all to stay indoors and off the decks."
"Why would you read something like that to me? Do you want me to stay home? Because I will! Just say the word!" He could not understand why I was so shrill. I wonder sometimes if my loved ones have actually met me.
I hardly slept the night before we left. I nearly flew home halfway to our embarkation point. I walked onto the ship in tears. Sailing out of Galveston and away from land was tough - I watched the land get farther and farther away and thought, "Well, here we go. Too late to back out now."
As the sun went down that first night, all I could hear in my head was the voice of the elderly Rose in the movie "Titanic" saying, "That was the last time the Titanic ever saw daylight."
When I told my son, he said, "Why would you even think that?" Well, welcome to my brain.
On the other hand, I had to practice, and I got very good at, living in the moment. I like to plan, I like to reminisce. I'm not very good at being in the moment. I had to learn to shut off the parts of my brain that wanted to play footage of sunken ships, sinking ships, trapped humans, waves, disaster... if I let it run, for even a minute, it would undermine weeks of work. So, I had to forcibly turn off the projector, as it were, every time it wanted to start up. I also had to enjoy every moment while it was happening - "Right now, I am safe. Right now, my kids are safe. Right now, we're having fun. Right now, life is pretty good."
And it was good. The sea was calm, and the ship was full of delightful things to do. I wasn't seasick at all, and I'm prone to motion sickness. My family was having a great time. I was having a great time.
I knew on the first morning aboard that I'd be OK. My son's alarm, on his phone, was set to something that sounded like an air raid siren from WW II. It was still set to go off at o'dark thirty, in another time zone, so that we could make it to the airport. It went off in the early hours of the morning, and I woke up sure that it was the ship's emergency signal. I started calmly running through the list in my head - put on warm clothes, get life vests from closet, head to Deck 4 - before he shut it off and I realized that it was the phone. It says something about how calm I was that I was able to fall immediately back to sleep.
There were still a few things that I worried about. I'd been afraid that waking up in the dark, in our inside cabin, would undo me, with the combination of dark and the feel of the waves. It didn't - it didn't bother me at all. Score one for me.
We spent three days in the Gulf of Mexico, and the water was calm. I worried about heading out into the Atlantic, though. Two places on the ship showed a "you are here" video screen, with a satellite view of our route and a little yellow arrow indicating our current position. The photo, of course, showed the different shades of water, indicating depth. After a stop in the Bahamas, we headed almost immediately over a defined line where sheltered, turquoise water turned into open, almost black water. Crossing that line made me very nervous. As we sailed away from our Bahamas stop, a storm was brewing - dark clouds rolled in, wind blew and rain began to fall.
Worse, you could sense the difference in the water almost instantly. After four days on the ship, it was now creaking. I know, of course, that the creaking is actually good; the ship had to react to water the way that buildings and bridges react to wind. There has to be give. Still, it was slightly unnerving.
The waves got bigger immediately. My husband and son seemed surprised by this. "I'm amazed. Do you know how much energy it takes to cause that? You'd think it would be flat."
No! No! I wouldn't think that it would be flat! It's the freakin' Atlantic Ocean! Had they never read any history, never seen any movies? Did they have no idea at all what the reputation of this ocean was? Did they think that it was only dangerous centuries ago, but it had somehow magically calmed down now that we technically savvy modern humans occupied the planet, that our "advances" somehow tamed the planet itself? Of course the waves were bigger! Of course it was stormy! How could they possibly have imagined that it would be otherwise? I said as much, and more; they looked at me as though I was some kind of experiment gone wrong.
That night was the hardest one so far. I knew that if I had to get into the lifeboats in that weather, especially in the dark, I would not handle it gracefully. At best, I would vomit and whimper. At worst, I would have a heart attack before I was ever loaded into the lifeboat. Still, there were no panic attacks, no tears, and I slept well. That was huge.
I'd also worried about the midpoint on the journey. Being dead center of the ocean, hours away from any help, sounded scary. The day came and went without me experiencing any anxiety at all. Wow, I thought. I got this!
Most of the time, the weather was gorgeous. Even the cruise director remarked, night after night, "Can you believe this weather? This isn't a typical Atlantic crossing." ("Your mother is so watching out for you!" my husband said. Thanks, Mom!)
We had one day of bad weather, so bad that the crew had to empty the pools, and the captain announced over the loudspeaker, "The ship is in no danger."
This is what it looked like before they drained the pools.
By then, day 10, I was rock solid. The only thing that annoyed me was the seasickness. I had to spend most of the day on deck, in the fresh air, and I felt it the exact moment the wind started to calm down. Even sliding back and forth on the bed while I was falling asleep didn't bother me.
By the time we had to leave the ship, I missed it terribly. We're already wondering when we can take another cruise. My husband keeps talking about taking another transatlantic cruise, going in the opposite direction this time, so that we gain an hour every time we cross a time zone. I do worry that, if we did it again, there would be more bad weather. I don't know how I feel about that possibility.
Do I understand those ancestors and explorers better now? Maybe a little. (Even though I had the buffet and the pool.)
I do know that I'm very proud of myself. I took on the fear, and I stared it down.
And I had a great time doing it.
Saturday, June 8, 2013
We Have Nothing to Fear But Fear Itself
"This is the bravest thing I have ever done," I said to my son. He looked at me skeptically, to see if I was being sarcastic or ironic or blatantly exaggerated; I was, after all, standing on a cruise ship. I was not joking; I meant it.
I like the explanation that Will Smith's character delivers in the movie "After Earth" about fear. "Do not misunderstand me. Danger is very real, but fear is a choice." Bravery, we know, is not the absence of fear, but the ability to work through it or past it.
Everyone likes to believe that their own fears are reasonable, and everyone else's fears are silly. I will readily admit this in myself. My fear is water - specifically, being trapped underwater and drowning. Dark water, deep water and submerged manmade objects intensify these fears. I feel the same way about this as the explanation of fear of heights from the TV show "The Big Bang Theory" - "Fear of heights is irrational and silly. Fear of falling, however, is prudent and evolutionary." Water can kill you.
I am not afraid of spiders, snakes or germs. I realize that under some circumstances, these things can kill you, but most times, they do not. If you put a person inside a sealed box of venomous snakes or spiders, it would be possible to avoid being bitten for an extended period of time. If you are still and don't startle them, chances are that they'll leave you alone. Even if you are bitten, chances are that you won't die. Germs don't care how calm you are, but a reasonably healthy person can fight off most germs automatically, without even knowing they're there. That's the entire job of the immune system. If you put a person in a sealed box full of water, on the other hand, they will die. Not "might" or "could," not "under the right circumstances," not "if you thrash or frighten it," but "WILL, " within a matter of minutes. They will die.
I try to be sympathetic and nonjudgmental when dealing with others and their fears. Still, I sometimes find myself being impatient when the fear is not life and death. For instance, I know that the fear of public speaking usually ranks higher than the fear of death for most people, but I cannot imagine why. I don't understand fear of rodents, or fear of insects. I know someone whose biggest fear is public humiliation; that barely makes my radar. I mean, everyone will face public humiliation many times in their lives. I certainly have, and I'm not dead yet. Sometimes, I'll watch someone struggling to avoid situations they think might be embarrassing, and I'll find myself barking, "Will it be fatal?" I mean, if the answer is "No," how bad can it be? One of the first things I tell my theater or speech students is, "Don't be afraid to look silly. You'll look worse trying to avoid it than you will doing anything else."
I manage to keep my fear reasonably in check. I swim, I go on boats, I once went in an actual submarine with viewing windows. Go, me.
On the other hand, darkness outdoors has never frightened me, ever, even filled with animal howls and bats. It's soothing, it's gorgeous. Indoor darkness, though, can be entirely unnerving, because it looks too close to being in a sunken ship. Not rational, but hey, there it is. So, although I recognize that my fear manifests itself in exaggerated ways - for instance, being unable to look at certain photos or film footage - I find it to be a perfectly reasonable fear.
My son wanted to go on a cruise for his high school graduation. We're only 4 hours drive from the Pacific, and he wanted to go on an Alaskan cruise. We chose one from Disney; we love anything Disney.
Then my husband found a transatlantic Disney cruise - 14 days for less money than the 7 day Alaskan cruise. Plus, we'd get to see Europe. Sounds like an easy choice, right?
And it was an easy choice, for the rest of my family. For me, not so much.
Ten of the fourteen days would be spent entirely at sea. Not just any sea, not my calm, placid Pacific, but THE NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN. That just sounded like days of seasickness followed by death, hours away from any help.
Before I do anything, I have to ask, "What could potentially go wrong? Could I live with that?" If the answer is "Yes," I do it. If it's "No," well, I don't. Any time I leave my house, I am aware that I could be hit by a car, contract a disease, be robbed - all sorts of stuff could happen. Things could happen in my house. I know the risk is there, and I accept it.
Don't try to tell me that that's the "wrong" way to look at things. I don't tell you how to live your life. You know how everyone always says, "Live each day like it's your last. Some day, it will be"? It's true. The last time I saw my dad, my mom, friends and relatives who have passed away, it was an ordinary day. Tomorrow, anyone I know might be gone. Tomorrow, I might be gone. The only guarantee is that I'm here now. None of us will leave here alive. Live like you were dying, my friend.
Death and I made our peace years ago. When he comes for me, I will greet him as an old friend.
I have, of course, put in requests with the Almighty. I would rather be shot to death in a burning building than have my death have anything to do with water. I have also requested that I not die in a flaming ball of shrapnel falling from 30,000 feet. The Good Lord is not obligated to honor these requests, but it doesn't hurt to ask.
(My husband, on the other hand, has to be almost positive that nothing bad could possibly happen, or he is paralyzed. If he considers what might go wrong, he will be unable to make any choice at all. He is therefore, from my perspective, frequently caught off guard and left floundering. "This shouldn't have happened!" he'll say. "How could this possibly have happened?" He has no plan of action at the ready, because he never considered the possibility that he would need it. I have contingency plans for my contingency plans.)
So, in order to sail off into the Atlantic Ocean for days on end, I had to say to myself, "Am I OK with four of my seven family members, including me, drowning at sea on this trip?" Answering "yes" to that is a difficult thing to achieve.
People tried to be helpful, but they didn't "get" it. They'd say things like, "Just stay indoors. Don't look at the water." I knew they meant well, but I wanted to say, "Oh, yeah - then I'll totally forget that it exists." I'm not a toddler. I know that things exist outside of my sight. Plus, if the ship sinks, being trapped indoors is far more terrifying than being on deck. During the emergency drill, they don't tell you, "Run into an interior space and you'll be fine." No, they teach you to go out on deck to the lifeboats. Being indoors does not mean being safe - in fact, it usually means the opposite.
"It's a cruise! It'll be fun!" they said. I know that; it doesn't help.
Think of it this way - what is your very worst fear? Your "Dear God, PLEASE don't let it be" fear, the one that will wake you up in a cold sweat. I'll use my daughter's as an example; hers is needles.
She avoids medical care until it's critical, and even then the worst part of any procedure is the needle. When she had surgery, they kept trying to talk to her about the procedure itself, how safe it was, how comfortable she would be, how necessary this was. She didn't care about any of that. She only cared that the anesthesia would be administered by IV, and that thought made her frantic and combative.
So, let's think about medical needles - how often will you need one? Vaccinations, surgery, blood tests, dental anesthesia - let's say a few minutes a year on average, for 30 to 60 seconds at a time. Most people will be exposed to them less than that. I had surgery this year, and enough blood drawn that my veins are scarring from it, and all told (including the surgery itself) it probably added up to 4 or 5 hours, over 365 days.
Now, imagine being stuck by needles every minute of every day for two solid weeks. That's 168 consecutive hours, or 10,080 consecutive minutes.
If you're afraid of public speaking, imagine being onstage with a microphone for 10,080 solid minutes.
That's the equivalent of what I was facing.
And I did it.
Yes. I did it, with a smile. And I had fun!
There were a few distressing moments, like walking out onto a lower deck at 10:30 at night during a storm, looking out at waves that seemed 10 to 12 feet high in the rain and blackness and saying, "If we have to get into the lifeboats tonight, I will die of a heart attack before I'm ever off the ship. I just thought you should know."
Yes, indeed, I had fun. Here's me, my husband and our host:
I warned people: I will now be insufferable. I am congratulating myself. I am very proud.
I don't expect people to congratulate me. In fact, I expect eyerolling: "Yes, yes, you handled a luxury experience. You. Are. Incredible. I am in awe." Still, I am feeling pretty bulletproof.
One of my kids noticed that I wasn't stressed at all while facing something that usually ties me in mental knots. I just smiled and said, "Fourteen days at sea."
Bring. It. On. I can handle anything. I am Chuck freaking Norris.
I like the explanation that Will Smith's character delivers in the movie "After Earth" about fear. "Do not misunderstand me. Danger is very real, but fear is a choice." Bravery, we know, is not the absence of fear, but the ability to work through it or past it.
Everyone likes to believe that their own fears are reasonable, and everyone else's fears are silly. I will readily admit this in myself. My fear is water - specifically, being trapped underwater and drowning. Dark water, deep water and submerged manmade objects intensify these fears. I feel the same way about this as the explanation of fear of heights from the TV show "The Big Bang Theory" - "Fear of heights is irrational and silly. Fear of falling, however, is prudent and evolutionary." Water can kill you.
I am not afraid of spiders, snakes or germs. I realize that under some circumstances, these things can kill you, but most times, they do not. If you put a person inside a sealed box of venomous snakes or spiders, it would be possible to avoid being bitten for an extended period of time. If you are still and don't startle them, chances are that they'll leave you alone. Even if you are bitten, chances are that you won't die. Germs don't care how calm you are, but a reasonably healthy person can fight off most germs automatically, without even knowing they're there. That's the entire job of the immune system. If you put a person in a sealed box full of water, on the other hand, they will die. Not "might" or "could," not "under the right circumstances," not "if you thrash or frighten it," but "WILL, " within a matter of minutes. They will die.
I try to be sympathetic and nonjudgmental when dealing with others and their fears. Still, I sometimes find myself being impatient when the fear is not life and death. For instance, I know that the fear of public speaking usually ranks higher than the fear of death for most people, but I cannot imagine why. I don't understand fear of rodents, or fear of insects. I know someone whose biggest fear is public humiliation; that barely makes my radar. I mean, everyone will face public humiliation many times in their lives. I certainly have, and I'm not dead yet. Sometimes, I'll watch someone struggling to avoid situations they think might be embarrassing, and I'll find myself barking, "Will it be fatal?" I mean, if the answer is "No," how bad can it be? One of the first things I tell my theater or speech students is, "Don't be afraid to look silly. You'll look worse trying to avoid it than you will doing anything else."
I manage to keep my fear reasonably in check. I swim, I go on boats, I once went in an actual submarine with viewing windows. Go, me.
On the other hand, darkness outdoors has never frightened me, ever, even filled with animal howls and bats. It's soothing, it's gorgeous. Indoor darkness, though, can be entirely unnerving, because it looks too close to being in a sunken ship. Not rational, but hey, there it is. So, although I recognize that my fear manifests itself in exaggerated ways - for instance, being unable to look at certain photos or film footage - I find it to be a perfectly reasonable fear.
My son wanted to go on a cruise for his high school graduation. We're only 4 hours drive from the Pacific, and he wanted to go on an Alaskan cruise. We chose one from Disney; we love anything Disney.
Then my husband found a transatlantic Disney cruise - 14 days for less money than the 7 day Alaskan cruise. Plus, we'd get to see Europe. Sounds like an easy choice, right?
And it was an easy choice, for the rest of my family. For me, not so much.
Ten of the fourteen days would be spent entirely at sea. Not just any sea, not my calm, placid Pacific, but THE NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN. That just sounded like days of seasickness followed by death, hours away from any help.
Before I do anything, I have to ask, "What could potentially go wrong? Could I live with that?" If the answer is "Yes," I do it. If it's "No," well, I don't. Any time I leave my house, I am aware that I could be hit by a car, contract a disease, be robbed - all sorts of stuff could happen. Things could happen in my house. I know the risk is there, and I accept it.
Don't try to tell me that that's the "wrong" way to look at things. I don't tell you how to live your life. You know how everyone always says, "Live each day like it's your last. Some day, it will be"? It's true. The last time I saw my dad, my mom, friends and relatives who have passed away, it was an ordinary day. Tomorrow, anyone I know might be gone. Tomorrow, I might be gone. The only guarantee is that I'm here now. None of us will leave here alive. Live like you were dying, my friend.
Death and I made our peace years ago. When he comes for me, I will greet him as an old friend.
I have, of course, put in requests with the Almighty. I would rather be shot to death in a burning building than have my death have anything to do with water. I have also requested that I not die in a flaming ball of shrapnel falling from 30,000 feet. The Good Lord is not obligated to honor these requests, but it doesn't hurt to ask.
(My husband, on the other hand, has to be almost positive that nothing bad could possibly happen, or he is paralyzed. If he considers what might go wrong, he will be unable to make any choice at all. He is therefore, from my perspective, frequently caught off guard and left floundering. "This shouldn't have happened!" he'll say. "How could this possibly have happened?" He has no plan of action at the ready, because he never considered the possibility that he would need it. I have contingency plans for my contingency plans.)
So, in order to sail off into the Atlantic Ocean for days on end, I had to say to myself, "Am I OK with four of my seven family members, including me, drowning at sea on this trip?" Answering "yes" to that is a difficult thing to achieve.
People tried to be helpful, but they didn't "get" it. They'd say things like, "Just stay indoors. Don't look at the water." I knew they meant well, but I wanted to say, "Oh, yeah - then I'll totally forget that it exists." I'm not a toddler. I know that things exist outside of my sight. Plus, if the ship sinks, being trapped indoors is far more terrifying than being on deck. During the emergency drill, they don't tell you, "Run into an interior space and you'll be fine." No, they teach you to go out on deck to the lifeboats. Being indoors does not mean being safe - in fact, it usually means the opposite.
"It's a cruise! It'll be fun!" they said. I know that; it doesn't help.
Think of it this way - what is your very worst fear? Your "Dear God, PLEASE don't let it be" fear, the one that will wake you up in a cold sweat. I'll use my daughter's as an example; hers is needles.
She avoids medical care until it's critical, and even then the worst part of any procedure is the needle. When she had surgery, they kept trying to talk to her about the procedure itself, how safe it was, how comfortable she would be, how necessary this was. She didn't care about any of that. She only cared that the anesthesia would be administered by IV, and that thought made her frantic and combative.
So, let's think about medical needles - how often will you need one? Vaccinations, surgery, blood tests, dental anesthesia - let's say a few minutes a year on average, for 30 to 60 seconds at a time. Most people will be exposed to them less than that. I had surgery this year, and enough blood drawn that my veins are scarring from it, and all told (including the surgery itself) it probably added up to 4 or 5 hours, over 365 days.
Now, imagine being stuck by needles every minute of every day for two solid weeks. That's 168 consecutive hours, or 10,080 consecutive minutes.
If you're afraid of public speaking, imagine being onstage with a microphone for 10,080 solid minutes.
That's the equivalent of what I was facing.
And I did it.
Yes. I did it, with a smile. And I had fun!
There were a few distressing moments, like walking out onto a lower deck at 10:30 at night during a storm, looking out at waves that seemed 10 to 12 feet high in the rain and blackness and saying, "If we have to get into the lifeboats tonight, I will die of a heart attack before I'm ever off the ship. I just thought you should know."
Yes, indeed, I had fun. Here's me, my husband and our host:
I warned people: I will now be insufferable. I am congratulating myself. I am very proud.
I don't expect people to congratulate me. In fact, I expect eyerolling: "Yes, yes, you handled a luxury experience. You. Are. Incredible. I am in awe." Still, I am feeling pretty bulletproof.
One of my kids noticed that I wasn't stressed at all while facing something that usually ties me in mental knots. I just smiled and said, "Fourteen days at sea."
Bring. It. On. I can handle anything. I am Chuck freaking Norris.
Friday, March 8, 2013
Darth Maul Goes to Disneyland
Last October, my family got to do something we've always wanted to do - we went to the Halloween party at Disneyland.
My daughters and I had to iron our costumes before we looked presentable, my husband had to inflate a bag to go inside his tall Mad Hatter hat, and my son in law had to buy a hat to replace the one he left at home hundreds of miles away. No one's costume needed more prep, though, than my son's.
The clothes were simple - black shoes, pants and long sleeved shirt, and the hooded black polyester cape he usually uses to be the Grim Reaper. He also had to shave his head.
Technically, his sister shaved his head. Before bed, the night before the party, we said goodbye to his hair.
He spent most of the next day in a hat, so as not to burn his lily white head.
At dinner, the real transformation started. The party started in the evening, so we got dinner at the Plaza Inn - one of our favorites - and broke out the paintbrushes, horns and spirit gum.
My middle daughter, Terry is a cake decorator and very artistic. Before we left home, she made horns out of air dry clay, numbered them, and fit them to Alex's scalp. She painted them with food coloring, and packed them.
Looking at a photo on her phone for reference, she started painting. After the main lines were drawn, she glued the horns on with spirit gum.
I helped fill in the large areas with color after Terry outlined them.
Two boys at an adjoining table inched closer and closer, finally abandoning their table.
The final result was amazing.
Here he is with his creator.
At the Star Wars photo op, the Storm Troopers reached out and wiggled the horns. On discovering that they were, indeed, stuck, they offered a fist bump.
As we walked past the living scarecrow, he said, "Oh, yeah. Darth Maul just ties you all together."
Oh, and he was chosen as the rebel spy on Star Tours.
I wonder what we'll do next Halloween to top that.
My daughters and I had to iron our costumes before we looked presentable, my husband had to inflate a bag to go inside his tall Mad Hatter hat, and my son in law had to buy a hat to replace the one he left at home hundreds of miles away. No one's costume needed more prep, though, than my son's.
The clothes were simple - black shoes, pants and long sleeved shirt, and the hooded black polyester cape he usually uses to be the Grim Reaper. He also had to shave his head.
Technically, his sister shaved his head. Before bed, the night before the party, we said goodbye to his hair.
He spent most of the next day in a hat, so as not to burn his lily white head.
At dinner, the real transformation started. The party started in the evening, so we got dinner at the Plaza Inn - one of our favorites - and broke out the paintbrushes, horns and spirit gum.
My middle daughter, Terry is a cake decorator and very artistic. Before we left home, she made horns out of air dry clay, numbered them, and fit them to Alex's scalp. She painted them with food coloring, and packed them.
Looking at a photo on her phone for reference, she started painting. After the main lines were drawn, she glued the horns on with spirit gum.
I helped fill in the large areas with color after Terry outlined them.
Two boys at an adjoining table inched closer and closer, finally abandoning their table.
The final result was amazing.
Here he is with his creator.
At the Star Wars photo op, the Storm Troopers reached out and wiggled the horns. On discovering that they were, indeed, stuck, they offered a fist bump.
As we walked past the living scarecrow, he said, "Oh, yeah. Darth Maul just ties you all together."
Oh, and he was chosen as the rebel spy on Star Tours.
I wonder what we'll do next Halloween to top that.
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