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Hope and the Happiest Place on Earth
Author: TriSec    Date: 10/31/2015 12:45:24

“We’re Going to Disney World!!”

What child doesn’t want to hear those magical words? I know plenty of adults that would be pleased by that statement, too.


In 2007, we journeyed down the coast to Florida for a few days with the mouse. If you check the calendar, and the history of this website, you might recall that we hadn’t quite launched yet. (First post – September 2007.) At that time, your blog triumvirate was in some intense negotiations for what our wee little corner of the internet might look like.

In those days, Bob and Raine lived in Atlanta…and our friend Mondo was in nearby Jacksonville, so we all made plans to meet up at the Contemporary Resort for an all-too-brief dinner during our trip. We scattered to the four winds, and hoped that we could meet up again sometime soon.

As for our visit with the mouse…Javi was just 6 years old at the time. We made grandiose plans to return in four years to celebrate his tenth birthday (2011).

But you can probably guess what happened. Luckily, we had an opportunity to get to Washington, DC for some presidential shindig, meeting up with Bob and Raine again, and meeting another member of our extended blog family, the lovely Wicked Pam. But just about a month later, I lost my job in the economic upheaval that was the great recession…..and things got ugly in a hurry.

The first thing we raided was the small savings we had for Disney, causing us to postpone the trip a year, then indefinitely. I bounced from job to job, temping here, contracting there, and raiding in turn our retirement accounts, Javi’s college fund, then finally his own personal passbook, something I swore we would never do unless we were faced with eviction, or worse. (Which almost happened in 2013). Throw in a cancer diagnosis, and we were pretty much financially ruined.

But we had one thing through all that – hope. Like all dictionary definitions, hope is defined rather dryly by our friends at Merriam-Webster:


intransitive verb
1: to cherish a desire with anticipation
2 archaic : trust

transitive verb
1: to desire with expectation of obtainment

2: to expect with confidence : trust


On New Year’s Day, 2013, it seemed like we could sink no lower. But then, something happened. We got a favourable repayment term from the courts – and we dug ourselves out of our back rent. I finished chemotherapy with a generally clean bill of health, and I got better. Mrs. TriSec got a number of small jobs, each one better than the last, until finally getting full-time employment in October of that year. And we were able to start paying off some old debts and maybe, just maybe, think about things like going away for a vacation.

2016 is a watershed year of sorts for the ol’ TriSecs. On July 14, Mrs. TriSec and I will be married 20 years. Not quite a month later, Your loyal TriSec and his young padawan have back-to-back birthdays with nice round numbers. (50 and 15). So when I saw this all lining up on the calendar, we started planning and scheming, and yes, hoping we could make it back to that “Happiest Place on Earth”.

In all those dark years, it was something to hold onto, to dream about, to plan for. It became an almost mythical trip – one that we could only ever dream about doing. Being in a position to make that dream a reality is almost surreal to me. We’ve been saving money for almost a year so we can do this trip “cash on the barrelhead”, and come home not owing a dime to anyone for this adventure.

I know Disney trips aren’t cheap. (like I said, we’ve been saving since January 1 of this year.) But our situation has improved dramatically. Debts are paid; Javi’s bank account has been replenished, and I even convinced a financial institution to give me a loan to buy a new car this summer.

So here it is. Next summer, the plan is to be in the fabulous Disney World resort for our birthday week – August 7-13. If you can – why not come join us?
 

1 comments (Latest Comment: 10/31/2015 13:33:40 by BobR)
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