September 9, 2001 - Two Days Before..

As much as I want to talk about what I was doing on September 10^th, 2001, I can't remember the specifics of that day before everything changed. I was more consistent in keeping a diary of what I did from day to day back then, but that was a day I never got around to writing about. So instead, allow me to go back two days before the planes crashed into the twin towers of the World Trade Center.

Back in 2001 I was working at Disneyland in an attraction called Innoventions. It's in that spinning building in Tomorrowland where America Sings and Carousel of Progress used to be. This particular attraction was about technology of the future (others will say an overblown commercial), and I was an interactive host doing game shows and helping guests have the best day possible at "the happiest place on Earth." Whoever said that never experience all the drama and raw emotions backstage.

Anyway, this particular day stood out because after the park closed, cast members (Disney called us that instead of employees) were invited to catch the last performances of the Country Bear Jamboree attraction. This one was close to its 30^th anniversary, and while Walt Disney never got to see it come to fruition, he loved the characters that were part of it.

Country Bear Jamboree was being closed down to make room for a new attraction which seemed sacrilegious to those working at the park, but change was in the air and we couldn't stop it. Some were joking that what was coming would be one part Circle-Vision, that 360 degree theater in Tomorrowland that had railings to hold on to instead of seats as we were made to feel like we were moving along with the images onscreen.

Others said the other part would be "Captain Eo," the sci-fi 3D short film directed by Francis Ford Coppola which starred Michael Jackson. At the time I was working at the park it had not been shown there for years, but guests still asked us where they could see it. We all figured all the guests would know "Captain Eo" was no more, but not many visit the park as often as we did. Sadly, it would take Jackson's tragic death to bring it back in all its dated 3D glory.

Eventually it would be turned into a Winnie the Pooh attraction which I've ridden several times, and my opinion of it remains the same: Eeyore isn't featured in it enough! Anyone who knows me personally knows I am a HUGE die hard Eeyore fan and have been since the 5^th grade.

While I was never a big fan of the Country Bear Jamboree, I felt obligated to attend its final performances. I had the unique privilege of saying I attended the last show, something millions of visitors could not lay claim to. It was like when the dorm I stayed in during college got a zero score on the first week of colleges; no else got a score as low as ours, so we wore it with pride and a delightfully cynical attitude. This is one of the things which made working at Disneyland feel especially unique and inadvertently gave me reason to not quit my job even after I was completely burned out from it.

After all these years, the bear I remembered most from the attraction was Teddi Barra who descended from the ceiling wearing a raincoat. This makes sense as she sings "Singin' in the Rain." Many will want the starring role in a production, but it's always the supporting players who command the most attention (I speak from experience). Other than that, the head portions of animals remain in my memory because only at Disneyland could animals like a stag or a bison could sing with pride while lacking the rest of their body. If only Dr. Herbert West from "Re-Animator" could perform miracles like that!

Many in attendance were wearing "Save The Country Bears" t-shirts which, while well intentioned, proved to be utterly pointless as the decision to close it was made long in advance. Still, seeing an attraction like this one close felt sad because a part of Walt Disney's spirit which brought about this park to fruition seemed to be dying a needless death. But change keeps coming for better and for worse, and Disneyland would never have survived without the corporate world backing it up.

When the final performance came to a close, the cast members operating the attraction asked if we wanted to see it one more time. Of course we said yes as it would lost on none of us that we were part of something so many others would never get to experience. Seeing it for another last time made us feel lucky for that reason, and when it was all over we gave the attraction a long lasting and extremely loud standing ovation. I personally felt privileged to be a part of this because many other jobs would never offer an opportunity like this.

There are those cast members who wonder if Walt is spinning in his grave with all the changes to his land of imagination. With attractions like this closing, we wonder how much of him is left in the park, and I'm not just referring to that urban legend that he's buried underneath the park. I've had the great opportunity of working with cast members who truly want to preserve the magic Walt brought to the park as it feels as though the damage Michael Eisner left in his path feels at times irreparable.

Looking back, the closing of the Country Bear Jamboree served as an accidental metaphor for things we would never be able to recover in the wake of September 11^th. Back then, I felt so lucky to be catching the bears' unfortunate end when so many others couldn't. Now it seems ironic that a couple of days later we said a horrific and unexpected goodbye to the twin towers in a way we didn't see coming. It proved to be a period of goodbyes we wanted to change the outcome to but couldn't. The world can be very cruel, and a decade has now officially passed where this was proven to us time and time again. Here's hoping we learn from the tragedy and to keep history from repeating itself.

See also:

The More Things Changed After 9/11, The More They Stayed The Same

September 11^th - 6 Years Later...