What Being a College Student at Disney World Taught Me

I spent this past spring break with some of my roommates in The Happiest Place on Earth, Disney World.  Now, I never went as a child and it had been three years since my last visit, so I had forgotten about the bizarre bubble that is Walt Disney’s brainchild and what a Disney vacation really entails.  Even though we didn’t go to some exotic country, or do some educational program at another university, I learned a lot of important lessons that I’ll need before I’m ready to go out into the real world.

1. Listen to your body, because it’s smarter than you.  I realized I don’t have the stomach for roller coasters like I did during junior year of high school, and I shouldn’t get on Space Mountain or Expedition Everest if I know it’s going to make me sick and cranky for the rest of the day.  Or I should buy that extra water bottle even though it’s ridiculously over priced, because if I’m dehydrated, the park really won’t be any fun.  My friends did a good job of making me feel included, asking me to come on the rides or at least wait with them, but I always ended up bailing right before a cast member asked “How many in your party?”  Even if the trip slowly became a lot of me waiting at the exit for everyone to get off the latest ride (or 3D movie—weak stomach, sorry), I was much happier in the end, because I didn’t push myself to do something I was uncomfortable with.
    
2. Listen to The Weather Channel, because it’s smarter than you.  I packed one long sleeve shirt, and one pair of jeans, four pairs of shorts, and six tank tops or short sleeve shirts.  Turns out, even for a girl who has lived in the Northeast her whole life, 40º is sort of cold, especially with 18 mile per hour winds.  I managed, but I definitely considered buying an extra sweatshirt or even a pair of pants from every store we passed.  I shouldn’t have assumed “Oh! Florida! Warmer than Boston!”  I should have looked up the forecast.
    
3. Taking a class on proper airport conduct should be mandatory. For everyone. Even people who have never flown or never plan to fly.  Because sometimes clearing security takes eight years, sometimes you lose your boarding pass, and sometimes TSA stops you because there may or may not be some funky residue on your hands even though you totally showered.  And flexibility is important, because sometimes your suitcase is too heavy and you need to pay extra, or sometimes your carry-on doesn’t fit and they check it for you.  Sometimes you get woken up mid-flight by the person next to you because they just want to chat, and sometimes you get the middle seat between two large, hairy old men who keep accidentally changing your TV channel and screen brightness with their elbows.
    
4. Group decisions are a pain. Group decisions with seven people are even more of a pain.  I went on this trip with six girls who I happen to already live with and love completely.  Now, five months after we all moved into our suite, I think we have a pretty good handle on what makes each other tick, or how we all deal with stress.  We handled group decisions pretty well, in my opinion; we were all on the same page regarding most matters, and in the event that we weren’t, we compromised just as well as we do here at BC.  But making seven people happy? We, like Snow White and her seven dwarves, had our work cut out for us. Most importantly, this item extends past which park to go to next, or what everyone wants to eat for dinner; it brings us to the most important issue we had the entire break: what do we do about the snow hitting Boston when we’re scheduled to return to campus?  We decided that the best option was to extend our stay one more day in order to avoid delayed flights on Thursday night, and secure seats on a plane departing Friday morning.  Group decisions need open communication and willingness to move on if you don’t get your way.  In the long run this compromise saved us a lot of grief at the Orlando International Airport when we did finally have to leave Disney.
    
5. Patience really is a virtue (and it’s something I have next-to-nothing of).  I’m a New Yorker through and through—I walk fast, I talk fast, and I get mad when others don’t do the same, making Florida a complete culture shock.  I ordered an iced coffee, and it took fifteen minutes to get my drink.  I’d start walking on a path to the bathroom that I thought would only take two minutes tops, but it took seven because I got trapped behind someone who apparently had all the time in the world and took one step every two minutes.  In any other situation, this would irritate me to no end.  But this time, we were on vacation in The Happiest Place on Earth, and it was something I would have to grin and bear until the end of our stay.  I’m 100% sure my New York attitude came through no matter how much I tried to hide it, and my roommates definitely have more patience with me than I have with slow-movers. I learned that sometimes I’m going to have to wait twenty minutes for a meal that should be out in five, and I’m going to have to be okay with it.
    
6. I’m glad my parents never took me to Disney World dressed up in full Cinderella costume.  Sure, it’s cute, but all I could think was “That melted chocolate ice cream dripping down the side of your face looks really good with that tiara. Wait, oops, it’s on your dress. Here’s a napkin,” and “I wonder what happens to that girl’s costume if she wears it on the Kali River Rapids. Is it see-through? Does the material get scratchy?”  Thanks, mom and dad, for saving me the discomfort of wearing a princess dress and sock bun for thirteen hours at a time in what could potentially be the hot and humid Florida sun.
    
7. I will not raise my children to think that log-rolling on the ground is an acceptable reaction to us leaving any given location.  The amount of craziness I saw when I was waiting for my friends to get off of Tower of Terror at the end of the night was absurd.  Four-year-olds holding on to poles, refusing to let go; ten-year-olds throwing temper tantrums and flailing their way over to the exits; teenagers saying they wouldn’t leave unless their parents bought them another souvenir.  The showstopper, however, was a seven-year-old boy silently stopping, letting go of his mother’s hand, dropping to the ground, and log-rolling back and forth until his grandma hoisted him up by the armpits.  To my future kids, if you read this, know that I am not having it.  When I say we’re leaving, we are leaving.  You will not pretend that your little sister’s stroller is a basketball player and that you’re just trying to play good defense by blocking it the whole way to the car.  If you pull this nonsense, I will tell Mickey Mouse, and he will not speak to you ever again.

I won’t recommend certain rides or shows (because there’s an 82% chance that I didn’t get on it), and what I do enjoy (World Showcase at Epcot!) doesn’t prove anything other than the fact that I am a 78-year-old grandma at heart.  But I will recommend that the next time you go to Disney World, you take to heart what I’ve shared and maybe even keep your eyes peeled for a few lessons of your own.

Photo Source:

Kristen Ambrose

• BC Friendship
• BC Spring Break