7 posts tagged “holiday”
My scream-a-piece is on the left, Victors is on the right.
The gingerbread man was late with his January rent so we're condemning his property and liquidating his assets (in milk of course)... Happy New Years everyone!
Wishing you and yours a merry Christmas and happy new years.
From the looks of things hardly anyone has noticed that I haven't posted anything in a while. The only indication of lack of interest in my blog has come from the hit counter service which hasn't emailed any statistics in a while... which reminds me of a topic I was going to bring up before the Christmas break -- the #1 traffic generating topic on my blog comes from not my words but from the photographs I've taken at Lake Allatoona showing how server the Metro Atlanta drought has become. Eh, go figure... It's nothing more than Google search generated traffic.
Anyway between working additional hours both during the week and over weekends plus all the general craziness of preparing for Christmas (and holiday traveling) blogging fell behind in priority but it's time to play catchup.
This December we made our annual holiday trip to Walt Disney World for a quick weekend getaway. Everyone that really knows me can bear witness for my love of Disney theme parks and property, I'm the kind of theme park guest that will actually start picking up litter if improbably disposes their food wrappers in the grounds. During the busy holiday season at Walt Disney World I sit back and take the time to thank the cast members (cm) I come across for making the magic happen. It's not a easy chore pleasing the every whim of an anxious public, hungry for a quality entertainment experience after having shelved out $74 for park admittance. Most hourly cast members still don't earn much money. Surely' not the amount their talents are worth.
Victor and I decided to have lunch at the Columbia Harbour House quick service restaurant in Liberty Square, the place was a mad-house of hungry customers and screaming children... you could see the strain on a few cm's faces but they tried their best not to let it show when it came time to interact with them. While waiting for our food I noticed a wooden sign in the back kitchen prepping area that read "Because nice matters, just try your best." and it's refreshing to know management is taking type that stance rather than forcing or threating cm's to be happy or else.
Victor and a few others have pointed out some cost-cutting measures Disney has implemented around the Magic Kingdom gone are the days back in the early 90's when buildings throughout property would receive a fresh paint of coat. I saw both high traffic and hidden away areas that required some sprucing by the maintenance crews, fading signs, chipping paint, and signs of wood rot. Also most noticeable by the everyday guest the holiday decorations around the Magic Kingdom where kept to a minimal this year. Mostly focused on Main Street the other lands had no visible sign of holiday decor on attraction facades. Disney not decking all the halls really let Victor down this year... in addition to that Disney management decided not to run the holiday version of the Country Bear Jamboree again for the second year in a row. That's usually not a good sign.
So despite all that we still enjoyed ourselves in Walt's Magic Kingdom and at the end of the day, as always, I wish I wouldn't have to leave.
A few more of our trip photos:
As I mentioned in the previous post my partner and I both spent our Thanksgiving holiday visiting his biological family in Ochlocknee, GA it was meant to be a special occasion as he was being reunited for his mother and their first Thanksgiving dinner together since 1988 so I wanted to do everything humanly possible to make the moment happen. His immediate family was incredibly warm and accepting of us, they appeared to be untroubled by our orientation nor the fact we're a biracial couple and didn't outwardly reflect any discontent or discomfort around us. Besides his mothers occasional off-color jokes of desiring a grandchild and "what ever happened to so-and-so, she was a nice girl" comments. Within the immediate family we were accepted and everything felt, well... normal... that is until conversation shifts to speaking of other ethnicities and words such as negro, colored, nigger, afro-man, and monkey are used unapologetically as common dialog.
As alarming as that may sound the word usage isn't always necessarily used in a derogatory statement. The Caucasians in these small towns have no problem referring to an African American neighbor as "the colored person across the street, or the negro man across the way" he isn't just a man or a person or even Mr. (insert name), a prefix or suffix is always used to identify a person that happens to be other than white. I remember one particular conversation surrounding cosmetic's and someone blurted out "I dont have lips like those, those are monkey lips." referring to photograph of a Caucasian woman with full lips. My partner felt at unease hearing his family and others using such language to describe things and attempted to correct them as he felt it might have offended me... however their apologies only made things worst.
Someone turned to me with a straight face and said, "Warren I don't look at you as black, you're like me, you're white you don't act or talk like them (blacks) do." Well, my partner and I were simply dumbfounded by that response. He felt very embarrassed to be related to anyone that could formulate such thoughts. While I simply took it as some sort of twisted backwards compliment understanding they weren't trying to be offensive. They just lacked the crass and vocabulary to properly express themselves... or at least that's the excuse I gave them in my head to allow myself to survive the holiday.
Now comes Thanksgiving Day and we made arrangements to visit family friends as they lived only sixteen miles away in Pelham, GA. Unfortunately, we all foresaw problems once we arrived at their small module house beside the highway with a confederate flag prominently draped across the living room window. We were welcomed inside and Vic's mother who accompanied us introduced me as Vic's roommate and instantly our relationship is thrown into the closet (surely for our protection). Everyone marveled and reminisced how they haven't seen Vic since he was a baby. All was well for that first half-hour despite no one bothered offering me a seat and I was left to stand. I thought nothing of it, I suppose I could have asked for a seat, but being a stranger in their house, I felt it impolite to just make myself at home, but regardless of that someone shortly after offered me a seat just as the older man apparently the owner of the house walked in from the back door and proceeded to walk through the house and out the front door. Just then he stepped out on to the front landing and shouted "THERE'S A DAMN NIGGER IN MY HOUSE!"
That was a bit of a surreal moment for me, I tried to put the comment into prospective. Was he referring to someone or something else? Could nigger have meant anything other what I thought it meant? I looked at my partner who was quickly turning pale and his mother who carried a blank expressions. Everyone had realized we obviously outworn our welcome. The woman that earlier welcomed us suggested it would be best if we left the house. Happy Thanksgiving!
Vic vowed to never return to again, which is rather sad -- certainly not what I had in mind, but the entire situation is rather unfortunately as we both realized that if they knew the truth about our relationship and orientation they likely wouldn't accept him anyway.
Nonetheless, we're both happy to be together back in Atlanta tonight.
I spent my holiday in small township called Ochlocknee in deep south Georgia nearly forty miles from the closest sight of civilization that exist across the Florida border. We came to visit Victors biological family and his mother whom he hasn't seen in over five years. Although they were glad to see one another the reunion the otherwise joyous reunion was marred by refections of just how bad our national economy is and affect it has on poorer rural areas which have suffered far worst. As most of America's elderly Victor's Grandmother is on a fixed income supported entirely by social security. Ochlocknee is mostly populated by less fortune families and the average person lacks a twelfth grade education. As unfortunate as that is there is also the element of unresolved racial tension that is still heavily embedded into the culture of rural Georgia. Victor's immediately biological family in southern Georgia isn't exempted either; while the family means well they still use inappropriate language when describing people unlike themselves and while they'll be the first to admit they lack the vocabulary to properly verbalize their thoughts it is still irksome to see the lingering effects of racism in the south... I'll post more later.
