Epcot is full of strollers, kids, and distracted parents, weaving across the paths. Everywhere I look objects sparkle painfully in the sun; the sky's too blue to look at. The giant Epcot ball appears shiny and crumpled like a giant mass of tin foil. A flute melody plays from speakers hidden in bushes so perfectly green and streaked with light they have to be plastic.
Each brightly shining attraction elicits yelps of excitement and loud, disjointed conversation all around us. A fountain sprays designs in time to the music and people stop in the middle of the path to watch and ooh and ah. A large plastic character who reminds me of Raggedy Ann ambles by, and kid squeal and rush to grab at her skirts, until they are stopped by the man in brown walking beside her. As the kids line up behind the man, I squint at her until I am certain she is not Raggedy Ann, but maybe a Disney version from a new movie I haven't seen. The Raggedy Ann I knew would need no man to save her.
This comes from the middle of Jessica Hollander's "Fantasy Land" which can be found in Keyhole 4. I love these two paragraphs as they hone in so well on the plasticity of Disney Land or Disney World. Nothing that perfect is real and this fits so well into Hollander's main theme. "Fantasy Land" is told from the point of view of a newlywed young woman, as she and her husband, Chris, are on a little vacation. A close to all-inclusive trip with which he hopes to gear her back towards looking for happiness. Hollander captures the difficulties in communications some couples have, as well as the varying ways of talking about important aspects of their married lives - kids, for instance. "Fantasy Land" is the perfect venue for this particular discussion with the many families roaming around,a nd the tons of kids for she and Chris to look at and talk to.
There's nothing overly flashy about Hollander's writing, which is a good thing as there's no intention behind the writing for that flashiness either.
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