As tenth birthday celebrations go, it ‘Disney’ get much better than this. Yes, for our oldest son’s recent ascent into double digits we entered into the gaping maw of Mickey Mouse at his Paris lair – and lived to tell the, er, tail.
Until this year, I had happily imagined I would go to meet my maker without ever boosting the coffers of the rapacious rodent, but although my spirit was willing my flesh proved weak. Disney’s insidious advertising campaign got a death grip on me, preying relentlessly on my fear of failure as a parent.
“When are you going to tell them?” it demanded during every commercial break on every children’s TV channel. “When are you going to tell them you are taking them to Disneyland Paris?” The ad reel then showed a range of creepy infants achieving varying states of quasi-religious ecstasy on being informed of a looming visit to Walt’s world.
Unsaid but implied was, “What?! You mean you haven’t taken your kids to Disneyland? No wonder they loathe you. You disgust me. How can you live with yourself? Max those credit cards, remortgage the house, sell a kidney, just make sure you take your kids to Disneyland or they will rightly despise you for ever.”
And so it came to pass that ten years to the day after number one son made his noisy arrival into this vale of tears, me, his mum, his eight-year-old brother and five-year-old sister found ourselves inside the Magic Kingdom, gazing in awe at the wonders of Main Street, Fantasyland, Frontierland, Discoveryland and Adventureland – and putting aside the crippling expense of eating, drinking or souvenir shopping, we loved pretty much every minute of it.
Yet while the parades were a kaleidoscopic spectacle and the rides kept us entertained for hours, the highlight came late in the day during dinner in Café Mickey. The pizza had been polished off, the last drops of fizzy drink drained, when the lights dimmed, celebratory music blared and over to our table bounded Goofy himself with a big birthday cake, candles blazing. And after seeing the look of sheer delight on our boy’s face as the oversized soft toy swapped high-fives and hugs with him, I’m beginning to think that at Disneyland maybe dreams can come true after all. Awww... n