rite of passage

Bill Barich traveled the length and breadth of California back in the early 90s and filled a book with his observations. Of course he had to visit Disneyland. Spoiler alert: he didn’t like it. 

I was a child in the 1970s, and Barich’s observation in this passage felt true then:

Disneyland [is] a cultural rite of passage. A child, especially a California child, could no doubt file a suit in court if his parents hadn’t taken him there by the time he was ten.

I pictured how the scene would play on the evening news, with some postliterate yellow-haired TV reporter kneeling to get the scoop.

‘We’re here with young Peter Piper of Gardenia,’ he’d say. ‘Pete, can you tell us why you’re suing your mom and dad?' 

‘I’ve never been to Disneyland.’ 

‘How old are you, Pete?’ 

‘I’m eleven!’

My childhood was so far along by the time I successfully pestered and bothered and cajoled my mother into scheduling a trip to Disneyland that I knew I was severely at risk of missing that golden window — I couldn’t be a grown up before I got to Disneyland! As Bill Barich harrumphs, for “an unaccompanied adult [Disneyland i]s not [the] great time,” the transportive ecstasy, that is, that it inevitably is for a child. 

It was clear to me that my brother and I were the only kids in school who had never been to Disneyland. It wasn’t fair! I remember poring over a library book about Disneyland; was it a Time-Life book? Whatever it was, the library owned it so it was scholarly not advertisement — oversize, filled with color pictures and breathless prose. I imagined myself skidding down the Matterhorn, the thrill of splashing into that pool at the bottom — the amazingly lifelike animatronics of the Country Bear Jamboree or the Enchanted Tiki Room — the meticulous attention to detail in the recreation of Main St (okay, I almost cared about Main St) — the African riverboat — the spinning cups of the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party. It was all so magical. Plus, every kid I ever talked to loved loved loved Disneyland and had been there many times. 

Mom was not excited. Big crowds, big expense (cheap compared to today), long drive to get there (we lived in Northern California, not Southern California), and nothing much of interest to her. She had friends who lived near Anaheim so wangled a weekend stay-over at their place. And my dreams could come true. I was 12. My brother was 13 or 14, a little long in the tooth for the fullest wonder experience, but young enough not to be jaded. 

Oh my God, I was so excited. I counted off the days on the calendar. I positively flopped about the floor like a fish gone to glory. 

I was disappointed. I’m glad I went. But every endless line in the hot sun, every worn facade, every underwhelming ride, every pushy tourist was a personal affront. Even space mountain was just a roller coast in the dark, not a science fiction-like blastoff to the beyond. This is the Happiest Place on Earth? The Magic was humbug.

This was back in the days of the graded tickets with E tickets for the exciting rides and A tickets for a seat on the trolley drawn by a plodding horse. You had to use all your tickets, of course. But when you got down to it, some of them weren’t worth tearing out of the ticket book. 

I’m glad I prevailed upon my mother because, as Bill Barich says, it was a rite of passage. Everybody else had gone, and loved it, how could I miss out on that? 

I’ve been a few times since. My high school graduating class went in 1983 (I saw Berlin live and didn’t know who they were). I went with my now-husband Kent who practically had the run of the place as a kid, he told me, and knew all the best secret places to hang out. The restaurant at Pirates of the Caribbean did have a beguiling atmosphere (crickets, twinkling stars) for something totally fake. California Adventure has been built since but I haven’t been back to see it. California Adventure? I already live in California. Fake Alps, fake Mississippi, fake Africa, sure, those places were all far away. But fake California? 

source: Big Dreams: into the heart of California

by Bill Barich

1994. Pantheon / Random House, New York