Living in Orlando was the opposite of what I thought my future held. When I graduated high school, I was ready to head up north and take on NYC after college and climb my way up the corporate ladder. Life happens when you’re making other plans.
Aaron got a great job in a town outside of Orlando a month before our graduation from UVM, and I was certain of my future with him. I begrudgingly returned to Florida, assuaging myself with the positives: I’d be closer to my mom and Aaron decided that with our close proximity to the parks, a Disney Annual Passholder membership was imminent.
It’s been three years since our graduation, and we’ve lived separately and together since. We started out in Orlando suburbs but now live in a neighborhood so close to the parks that we hear the fireworks at night as we get ready for bed. We tend to go at minimum once a month, though often more. It’s surreal to think that a vacation that families save up a year to provide their kids is just a typical Saturday for us. We are so very very lucky.
After being a Passholder for nearly two years, I know the parks like the back of my hand. I know all the tricks, how to maximize your time, and will give you random fun facts while you wait in line. Truthfully, my first job out of college made me really sad and I often felt like it crushed my soul. I would go to Disney World and get a little bit of that spark back, get a sense of what it feels like to be happy, before going back to work on Monday (repeat for a little over a year). Now I’m out of that job and even closer to the parks and it truly does spark joy in my heart.
So you can imagine my disappointment when this tweet, and the corresponding Facebook post, made it’s rounds on the internet last month:
I don’t particularly love the language used in this post, but if it’s good enough for a toddler mom to share, it’s good enough for a childless millenial to post. Am I right?
There was a lot that bothered me in this post, but I actually started to think about the root of the “problem”: a lot of millenials have been flocking to Disney lately. And my question is: why?
I have never taken a sociology course (though I think I accidentally sat in on the first five minutes of one after mixing up the building names for a different class my junior year at UVM), nor have I done any legitimate research. This is all conjecture, one childless millenial’s theory (or theories):
- There’s a lot of millenials out there. Statistically speaking, the generation born between the late eighties and the mid-nineties is the largest since the baby boomers of the fifties. Thanks for the prosperity, Reagan, I assume, because your success sure made for a lot of baby happy parents. There may just be an influx of millenials in all public spaces because there’s just a lot of us. If you don’t like us at Disney, I promise you, we’re at Universal, Legoland, the Tate Modern, the Eiffel Tower, we are in your favorite juice bar both ordering and serving you an acai bowl. We are on the other end of the phone, repairing the internet browser connection for you while simultaneously troubleshooting your printer. We are in your daughter’s classroom, teaching her how to read. Mind your manners. Or should I say:
- Millenials hit the technological goldmine: our tiny tot years had VHS tapes. Music went from tape players to Walkmans to iPods. Our tween years had the internet. Our teens and twenties had (and have) social media. We have more access to shared Disney content than any other generation. What’s more…
- The sixties, seventies and eighties saw a bit of a slump for Disney. It wasn’t until 1989’s The Little Mermaid that Disney started to get it’s magic back. With releases of the classics on aforementioned VHS tapes, we could spend all day singing to Cinderella and Snow White. Then came the true evolution of the Disney “Renaissance”: Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, The Lion King, Toy Story (and Toy Story 2), Mulan, and Tarzan were all released in the 1990s. We watched them in theatres and then they were popped into our VHS players for us to watch over, and over, and over again. Personally speaking, my mom had CDs of Disney music ranging from the most recent triumphs to the earliest tunes. On hot summer days, she’d play the CDs on our home speaker system so we’d be listening to Disney music by the pool. My privilege may be showing, but you get my point: our generation not only had the most access to Disney, but more quality Disney content was provided to us than that previous generations.
- Remember how I said this is all solely conjecture? Here’s my biggest doozy:
The previous generations were old enough to recognize what happened when the planes hit the towers. All millenials could recognize that some scary people with hate in their hearts destroyed some special buildings, and that a lot of people died. Our parents were scared. Family members flew out to foreign countries in camouflage and didn’t come back. Getting on planes took way longer. Grown-ups were just different.
To me, it makes perfect sense that my generation has a stronghold on Disney. It is a crystal clear marker of happier times, of apple juice and dress-up. Playing in the pool (or lake, or ocean) pretending you were Ariel, or wanting to shoot a bow and arrow like Mulan, wanting to grow big and strong like Hercules, wanting to be smart like Belle, wanting to be king, like Simba. Our hopes and dreams, our peace of mind, is tightly connected to Disney.
I feel as though a lot of the same people who would agree with this frustrated mom would likely support the notion that millenials are special snowflakes who got participation trophies and live their lives with kiddie gloves on and a helmet. While some millenials do still have their training wheels (I’m not ashamed to admit that I’d be much worse off were it not for the support system I have), a lot of others work more than one job to stay afloat. Most have thousands of dollars in student debt. It’s likely that a lot of them will be renting until their forties. Some are still feeling the aftershocks of prejudice that is only just now being slowly washed away, and some are still living in the harsh reality that if change is coming, they won’t be alive to see it come to fruition. It’s tough growing up in general, and I’m sure that every person on both sides of the argument can agree with that. Millenials just happen to have found comfort in the memories of their childhood.
Disney World is a truly magical place. It inspires hope, unites families, and reminds you that while emotional maturity makes you a grown-up, you can always be young at heart. One of my favorite traits about me is my childlike sense of wonder. I’ll ask the silly questions, I’ll get some answers, I’ll laugh and smile and sing the songs. Happiness is such a beautiful thing. I will always feel at home in Disney, and I’m not embarrassed by its place in my heart.
A fellow Disney fan posted this note on Facebook, and I think it rings true for me and the other “childless millenials” that roam the parks:
To my fellow millenials: grab hold of your dreams, and make them come true.
To the frustrated, tired mom of Aiden: I’ll gladly wait with him for a pretzel, and gently teach him that patience is a virtue if he gets cranky in line. In the meantime, you should sneak over to Tom Sawyer’s Island. In my experience, it’s pretty quiet, and you can get a quick nap in before the afternoon parade. We’ll bring you a Mickey ice cream while we’re at it.
