It's Disney World!

I'd really like to write a post about how beautiful Disney World was
And how I can't wait to come back
And how I got to relax and at rejuvenated and ready to go back to school on Tuesday

But I can't do that.
Not that it wasn't beautiful. It was. The decorations and theming and plants and land were all shockingly gorgeous. I have a billion pictures of things being beautiful and us having an amazing time in this stunning place.

I definitely CAN wait to come back. This was an amazing experience. And I'm so grateful for the fact that we got to go (for free!) and live the Disney way for a week. Especially my birthday week.
But there was so much walking. The stimulation is exhausting. And the long lines were tiring. I'll be back at an undetermined date. A small part of me wonders if I'll be back before I have kids of my own to bring.

It was magical in a different way than I expected. The amount of people, the greenery, the schedules, the insane amounts of planning. People aim to have amusement parks as successful as Disney World, but I can only hope for something more intimate.

There's not much relaxing to do here. Not if you want to see everything, ride some things, and eat at cool restaurants. There's lots of walking to waiting and waiting to walk. The lines do move quickly. And the cattle gates they shove us through aren't too small or unmanageable, but it's tiring. I need a vacation after my vacation. My bed has never called to me louder.

Disney is an experience, not a vacation in its most normal connotation. It's a portal into another dimension you are pulled into with all your being, nourishes your imagination and sucks the energy from your toes to your nose. (Starting at the feet with all that walking...) You are equally intrigued and warped into wanting to stay and never leave, and collapsing in tiredness and being spat back into the abyss of normal life.

You also spend a lot of money. Like $200 on art you have no walls for it to hang. You buy pins and magnets and squish pennies and spend unaccounted amounts of dollars on your weight in bottled water. Everything is branded. It's really amazing actually. The thought, the time, the conception and production of thousands (millions?) of different products arranged in themed stores and normal stores and kiosks and restaurants and... everywhere. It truly is an empire.

Disney World isn't a vacation. It's a trip. It's an untouchable world with an unbreakable facade of happiness. You're shuffled around, and marketed to constantly, but you keep coming back because there's so much happiness and magic and food and true joy, you can't help but return and refuel yourself with Disney magic. It's a world all its own. It's crazy and loud and a big shopping mall, but it's also the only place that people wearing sparkly mouse ears isn't weird. Where fireworks are nightly experiences. Where you walk off more calories from your hotel room to the lobby than you get from all the rice krispy treats you eat. Where there's stores at every turn and someone always wishing you a magical day. Where costumes are regular and everything is themed.

It's Disney world. It's magical and amazing. And I'll be back.
But I'll be asleep for the rest of the holiday break before that happens. And maybe on a cruise to actually relax... And trying to find a way to display all the art I bought... and eat all the Disney snacks we carried home...

But it's Disney world. You can't NOT have a good time!