1.) The Ones We Love
There is nothing better than being with the people you love the most. I am positive that my Heaven will look like my parent's kitchen on a holiday, filled to the bursting with everyone we know and love (and probably a few people one of our relatives has adopted for the occasion since they didn't have a family event planned and that confuses us.) It can be simpler than that, though. Recently, my fiance came to visit me here in Disney. The four days he was with me flew by in such a happy blurr that I am positive that I drove him to and from the airport on the same day. We spent our days laughing, holding hands and walking through the parks, riding what we could, not worrying if the line was ridiculously long because we were together and happy and I think that might be Heaven. Sure, he totally kicked my butt at both Toy Story Midway Mania and Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin but, hey, one of us plays video games for fun and the other reads old British murder mysteries. (When someone gets poisoned at the grand duke's dinner party we'll see who's hobby is the most useful...) Sure, we probably ate too many snacks, spent too much time in the sun, stayed up too late, not wanting to be apart a moment longer than we had too, but when I finally collapsed in to my bed after returning him to the airport I felt the heavy exhaustion that comes from having a part of you pulled away abruptly, without ceremony, and only a little against your will. For me, Heaven will be with my Prince Charming in a little house with a bright window, a small vase of flowers, and a kettle whistling happily... and possibly a very fat cat.
2.) A Connection to Home, However Fleeting
No matter what you think about where you grew up, or the place you identify as where you are "from," you will always feel a connection to that place and the people from it. For Pittsburghers like myself, the connection is less "a fond sense of belonging" and more "a borderline patriotic sense of fraternity and loyalty unto death, yinz guys. SIXBURGH!!!!" What I'm saying is Pittsburghers are a more connected lot than most and when we find each other in foreign territory we get more than a little excited. When guests read my name tag and see University of Pittsburgh they always have some story related to the city and whenever that story includes "we live there" there is always the rapid fire questions about where exactly and do you know so-and-so or have you been here that always reminds me of the tittering of my girlfriends and I at a middle school sleepover. We get excited when we find each other because it makes us feel at home. We are with people who are like us, we're sure of it, simply because we come from the same world. At home, walking the streets of our own city, we might never speak, might think of each other as totally different with nothing at all to bond over but here, both of us completely out of our territory, we might as well be long lost cousins. Heaven will always be Pittsburgh for me.
I have had many princesses from Pittsburgh, and many more that have some connection to the city or the University (thanks to Pitt, most sincerely, for helping with some of my Make a Wish princesses. The fact that they have been in my chair after seeing you means you have done something amazing.) I had three within the last week that are worth sharing simply because they made me feel so close to home that I still get the warm nose and eye tingles thinking about them. I met the first princess when I walked up to the podium and saw her mom wearing a button that said "I'm Celebrating!" underneath which she had written in Sharpie "Life!!!" I said "Now there's the right idea!" nodding to the button. And then I noticed the head scarf with the pink ribbons under her mouse ears. She saw my name tag and immediately asked if I would be her girl's Fairy Godmother because my University was the one that made their celebration possible. I was thrilled. My princess, mom, and big sister burst in to the boutique with laughter and giggles and the appropriate oohs and ahhs and I had more fun in that half hour than I had all day. They loved my stories, they laughed at every joke (even my most subtle pauses, tone shifts, and facial gestures got the uproarious laughter they doubtless deserve,) and they talked about home with me. They are from Mt. Lebanon, a place I have probably only been to once or twice, and I am from the North Hills, a place they assumed was populated entirely by malls, but for that fleeting instant we were family, yinzers, a proud branch of the Steeler Nation abroad and so happy to find someone else who spoke our language. My next local princess was also from a part of the city I have rarely been too but her aunt had a Slippery Rock University shirt and those just aren't that common. Upon further inquiry I discovered that her son, my princess's cousin, is in my sister's music class and they live within walking distance of one another. This princess was perfect, asking all the right questions, prompting all my best stories (see the theme here? Pittsburgh princesses know how to get the best FGIT experience) and generally setting me up to earn my 8th (count 'em) GSF card. Finally, I had a princess that brought me so close to home that I felt, for just an instant, that if I could only go home for an hour I would. The family noticed my name tag and started with the traditional "what part of the city are you from?" questions. They said "North Hills." I said "Me too." They told me the town. It was my home town. My little, everyone knows almost everyone town. They told me the neighborhood. It was mine. I finally laughed, "Please tell me you don't live on my street or I'm going to feel really bad not recognizing you!" They lived a street over in the newest part of the neighborhood. They had been on my street, walked across my driveway the day before for the annual garage sale. We had a great time and my princess was ecstatic with her transformation but I remember, amid the giggles and the princess stories, a pang of jealousy that they had seen my home, with it's flag waving, it's gigantic, lopsided pear tree, and it's warm, welcoming red front door more recently than I had by a long shot. Heaven, for me, has a red front door.
3.) Laughter
What I will miss the most when my time to leave Disney comes is the way my friends and I could get each other laughing so hard we couldn't breathe. This is a fairly regular thing and, despite the lack of air, I cannot recommend it highly enough. Everyone should laugh to the point of wheezing at least once a week. I am positive the giggly, tired feeling the results from this is exactly how everyone feels in Heaven.
Sam is by far the best person for getting me this way and I think I get her in equal measure. I once gave a spirited reading of the horrific Harry Potter fanfiction "My Immortal" that took us hours to get through because neither of us could keep from laughing until we cried. (Do, please, look up that story for a hilarious couple hours you'll never get back.) Sam nearly caused me to wreck the car once because we, and all our roommates, were driving home from dinner and passing Sea World. Someone said something about dolphins and I chimed in with my usual dolphin comment, "They kill for fun, you know." I will never know what Sam was trying to explain because she followed my fun fact with "Like the Danes..." I laughed so hard I could not stop long enough to ask what she meant by that and by the time I got it together I simply said "That's racist... Rude." and we never bothered to finish the thought. To this day we simply add "like the Danes" to any description of something horrifying or otherwise inappropriate.
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| Thai Thursdays: Scene of more uncontrollable laughter and questions about Asian Culture than anywhere in Orlando |
Often, other guests provide the beautiful laughter I so enjoy. On my first visit to the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor (which everyone should do, by the way) Sam, Andi and I were waiting to walk in and were standing next to a couple and their little son who was probably about 4 and very excited. When the tv screens in the waiting area began showing a video of Mike Wazowski explaining the show this little guy jumped in to a sumo stance, threw his arms out in front of him like he was carrying a huge bundle of something and bellowed "MIKE WAZOWSKI!!!! YEEEEEAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!" We lost it. We laughed and laughed and the more excited this kid got the harder it was to keep it together. Apparently, Mike is his favorite character and he had yet to see him anywhere. He totally didn't care what anyone thought because he was beyond a reasonable threshold of excitement. Everyone should be that excited about Disney. It is still one of the funniest things I have ever seen. Heaven is being a four year old and Heaven is laughing like that.
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| A demonstration. |
4.) People to Make Feel Special
My job is to make people feel special. I do it everyday, all day, and I love it. But in a way, it's expected of me. Even though each guest is thrilled and often surprised by how special they can feel it is a generally accepted thing that at Disney the Cast Members will make you feel special. That's why I love doing it out of costume. I think we all do. Recently my roomies and I went to Magic Kingdom for a Dole Whip run and decided to get our picture with Mickey and Minnie. While waiting in line we met a little girl who was celebrating her second birthday and was so excited to meet our boss and the Mrs. We played with her, made her laugh and smile, and got her to do cute poses while we waited. By the time it was their turn to go in they asked to bring us with them because we had been most successful at making her smile. This little princess lost her mind at the sight of Mickey. Moments before she had been terrified but because she had made friends with us and we had talked about how great Mickey was she felt no fear. The smile on her parents' faces was almost as wonderful as meeting Mickey.
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| Meeting the boss. |
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| Aaaaand... promptly having a dance party with him. |
5.) Bright Swirls of Color
I had a Make a Wish princess not too long ago who inspired me to even think about Heaven. I always ask the princesses about what they like to do and if they don't just tell me stuff I ask them questions like "Do you like to dance like Cinderella? Do you like to sing like Aurora? Do you like to draw like Rapunzel?" This princess jumped at drawing. She told me she loved to draw and so I asked her what was her favorite thing to draw.
"Heaven."
My breath caught in my throat but she said it so matter-of-factly that I had to press further. "How do you know what it looks like, princess?"
"I saw it!" This accompanied by a knowing, almost eye rolling gesture, as if nothing could be more obvious.
Her mom sniffed and I turned to look at her. She informed me that this princess had indeed technically died for about a minute a year ago during a treatment. "Is it beautiful, princess?"
"It has all the colors in the whole world! And it's really light! The sun is there all the time!"
She was excited about her drawings for a moment and then moved on to ask me questions about Rapunzel. Afterward, her mom showed me a few of her pictures on her phone. Bright swirls of colors and always a central point of white that looked like blinding light compared to the whirls around it. She had bought her a giant box of crayons when the princess explained there were way more colors she needed.
No matter what you believe, whether it be in an afterlife or merely that Heaven is a state of mind, I think Heaven is always a bright swirl of colors. It's moments and people and emotions rushing past and swirling together. It's waves of happiness and laughter crashing in to shadows of moments lost and people missing and instances you thought were so important that you can barely remember now. It's the bright, blinding light of home and the enveloping sensation of everyone you love around you. It swirls around and you feel that exhausted laughter bubbling uncontrollably out of you and the colors are everywhere. All the colors in the whole world.
