I’m Going to Disneyland!!! (or World)
Have you ever come back from vacation and wish you could turn right back around and leave your old life behind? You get out of your car from the airport and reality smacks you square in the face when you check the overflowing mailbox and it’s filled with bills. Then later, you know you’ll have to pay more money to get the dog out of the kennel. And this is on top of the, who knows how much is on the credit card, because of the, “Hey, don’t worry about it, we’re on vacation,” attitude you had all week.
Taking a vacation is something everyone should do as often as they can. But just know that you’ll never be able to justify affording it, even when it’s free.
Before my wife and I had our daughter, we used to go on three or four trips a year. Now we go on one or two, but that’s only because we stay with friends or family.
We weren’t going to go on any trips this year, but then we got lucky. My mom had a conference at Disney World. She was gracious enough to pay for me, my wife, and our two-year old daughter to go see Mickey and Minnie in Orlando. My mom put us up at one of Disney’s resorts and we had an adjoining room. She also told us to charge everything to the room and not to worry about it. Cha-ching.
It goes without saying that Disney is expensive. How expensive, you may ask? A room where we stayed is normally $250 a night. A soda in the machine is $2.75. A six-pack of beer (Bud or Coors Light) is $15.00. That same beer is $6.50 each at the bar. Lunch for four adults and a baby was well over $100.00 every day. Dinner? A lung or kidney—your choice.
In spite of the cost, we all had a great time. My little girl got to see all the princesses—Aurora, Belle, and Cinderella. She also got to see all the characters—Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Pluto and Goofy. It was worth all the craziness and price gouging because you get to forget about your normal life for a week. You forget that you have a list of fifteen bills waiting for you at home once you see that little girl smile and get so excited about seeing her heroes in real life. At that moment you could care less about your life at home. You want to soak it all in so you can relive it when you’re old.
Then you ride the bus for an hour to get back to the airport. You go through all the joys for airport security. Your two year old cries for an hour straight on the airplane and you become those people and you already wish you could be back at the resort drinking a $6.50 beer.
You’ll always have bills, and most likely, money problems. It would be nice to shed that heavy coat forever and have a permanent vacation state of mind. When I figure out how to do it, I’ll let you know. Until then, one or two weeks a year are going to have to do.
Need more? Here’s the best Disney song ever.