Other Worldly

I had the opportunity yesterday to go someplace I'd never been before: Disney's California Adventure. I hadn't heard very good things about it, but then, what I'd heard were evaluations of the "rides:" not very good, was the verdict, but the judges were more the Magic Mountain sort of teen adventure seekers, and, yes, I could see how by their lights they could be right.

But the first thing I noticed was that California Adventure is not an "amusement" park. I was raised near Willow Grove, PA, where there was an amusement park. People would come from Philadelphia to spend the day in rather gentle amusement, on roller coasters and ferris wheels and swan-boat rides-- and listening to John Phillip Sousa conduct the band in the gazebo!

In a way, California Adventure was more like that. I mean, there were families strolling, and amusements for children, and Disney-themed distractions (I wouldn't say "attractions"), all spread out for lots of walking and very gentile behavior. (Everyone was very polite.) And more than rides there were restaurants and eateries and souvenir stands and opportunities to spend even more money, adding in a gently suckling way to the (to my mind) rather outrageous cost of admission.

Plus there was entertainment, or what passes for it these days, which is to say, nothing of the enduring quality of Sousa, and all of it far less martial. There were stage shows, and a traveling "high school musical" review. And there was music, ubiquitous music, coming from speakers always within earshot, so that one could scarcely have a quiet thought of one's own, for the constant buzz of reminders of where one was and how one was to feel. Why I wasn't more annoyed at the music was a testimony to its success in setting my mood.

The day was more relaxing than exhilarating, and therein lies the loss of "amusement," or at least the change in its cultural definition since the time of Sousa and slower roller coasters. California Adventure is a "theme" park; it makes no claim to "amuse." No wonder the Nirvana generation, with its "here we are; now entertain us" sensibilities is neither amused nor entertained. As a theme park, California Adventure succeeds quite well. One is ushered in fine tram fashion from the ordinary world of one's usual habituation into this "themed" world, in which everything is eerily similar to one's other world (especially if one is residing in California), only cleaner, and cheerier, and far less problematic.

A little slice of Heaven on earth? Both my partner and I knew of people who bought annual passes to Disney's parks and to Knott's Berry Farm, and regularly went there for... escape? or relief? They go often, looking for a "better place"...

I was reminded of that phrase, a "better place," because I've been told often lately that that is where my mother is: a "better place." And it made me wonder about the possible similarities between our visions of Heaven and our experiences of "theme" parks: Is Heaven just another Theme Park to us?

I find myself recoiling inside, wanting to say, I hope not! But I don't know why not... I mean, my mother's mother believed that after she died she'd go to a place where the streets were paved with gold, and when she spoke about it, what she envisioned Heaven to be was quite like what she knew Philadelphia to be like, only cleaner, and with gold cobblestone streets!

I don't know that my mother's visions of Heaven were as explicit, but being at California Adventure made me wonder whether our visions of Heaven were influencing what we looked for in places of diversion, and by the by, whether our places of diversion were not somehow influencing what we hoped to find in our after-lives?

...

All of that philosophizing aside, someone asked me whether I thought my mother's being in a "better place" was somehow now letting her have a greater, and presumably consistently benevolent influence on my life and other events in this plane. I thought about it, and I think that for the moment anyway I can't be sure about Mom's continuing actions in my life. I certainly could use her help and compassion, don't get me wrong! But while I am less sure about what role she's playing in my life now, I thought for sure that Mom had had some influence over events in the National League East, where the Mets suffered the "greatest collapse" in the history of baseball, and Mom's beloved Phillies scarcely lost a game since she died, even with one of the worst bullpens in major league ball, thus securing a conference title and a place in the playoffs.

That is, I was pretty sure that Mom was behind whatever divine intervention had brought all of that about... UNTIL the Phillies lost two straight games-- HOME games, no less-- to the Colorado Rockies, to just about doom their chances of going further. Mother, if she's watching, is surely "groaning in travail" with Dad and me over the Phillies' poor play.

And maybe she's finding more Colorado Rockies' fans in Heaven than Phillies' fans! Someone up there sure seems to be on their side!

Blessings...