Space Mountain — With the Lights On
Space Mountain in Tomorrowland of Walt Disney World is much more frightening with the lights on. It is an indoor roller coaster at the Orlando theme park. While I’m certain that my memories are clouded, what I imagine when I think about it is a home-made model of the solar system that has been painted in glow-in-the-dark paint.
When you are flying through the dark and those planets and stars are shooting past you, they look awesome. You can imagine you are actually floating through space on a mission of the utmost importance. When the ride breaks down while you are going around a sharp curve and brings you to a sudden stop and the lights come on, you see the fishing wire, coat hangers, and styrofoam. The reality of how little space there is between your head and the track sinks in. As workers climb a ladder to the left of the car you are in, it becomes very clear that this trip to space was never really safe in the first place. As you get a good look at Space Mountain with the lights on, the track resembles a bowl of spaghetti with little space between the noodles far more than a rocket soaring through the vast expanse.
I was sixteen years old. Hubby was with me. My youth group had taken a bus down to Orlando. It was a long ride. There was no such thing as a “Fast Pass” back then. We waited in line for a long time to board that spaceship.
The cars are different now. Each car holds three people with each seat being separate. There are safety features that did not exist in the 80’s. When we rode it that day, each car could hold up to four people, but there was nothing that separated you, except a nylon belt. If there were only two in your group, then that “big rocket” had a lot of extra space and as it “blasted off,” the g-force would press the two people together into the back of the car.
Hubby had one hand holding onto me with his arm around my waist and one hand holding onto his groovy Fedora. Yep, Hubby wore a gray Fedora around Walt Disney World. I thought he was the coolest cat in the happiest place on earth. When we were ready to be propelled into the beyond, he was so worried he would lose that hat that he held onto it as tightly as he did me. That meant he had no hands holding onto the safety rail along the side of the car. Every turn slammed us against the side until we came to a screeching and sudden halt.
When I mentioned to Hubby that I may use this story to explore the idea of space, “like the space between us or something.” His response was,
“There was no space between us! Your fine ass was pressed into my crotch the whole time.”
If we went to Disney World today, I would love to ride Space Mountain again. Hubby would not. It has nothing to do with my fine ass. He gets motion sick. I sort of knew this when we rode Space Mountain all those years ago, but I didn’t grasp the magnitude of his motion sickness. He has told me that the ride breaking down is probably what saved him from throwing up all over the back of my head that day. Because we stopped, he had a chance for his stomach to calm down. I was having a blast. I was in front, laughing and loving every minute of it. I had no idea he was right behind me just trying to keep from vomiting!
When you have been together as long as we have, you begin to think about space differently. There is a natural orbit, but it isn’t circular. Sometimes you are closer to each other. Sometimes you are farther away. One of you can be in front laughing while the other is just trying to keep from tossing their cookies in the back. Often the lights are on so you can see the fishing line, coat hangers, and styrofoam. That can make it all even more frightening, but man, what a ride!
Space Mountain was definitely more frightening with the lights on. It didn’t take long for the employees who climbed up the ladder to fix whatever needed to be fixed. And, none of us riding the coaster said,
“Excuse me, we would like to get off this ride now because clearly it is unreliable and likely unsafe.”
Hubby had just enough time for his stomach to settle so that he could make it through the remainder of the ride without puking. He had enough time to readjust, make sure his hat was safe, and that my ass was firmly planted. The workers climbed down. A few moments later, the lights went off and our rocket was going full speed again. The fishing line, coat hangers, and styrofoam were gone. We were flying again.
