Story by 95 year old guest writer Lois McKinney
As I begin this story, I’m sitting in the Eugene airport waiting for a flight to Las Vegas for the first leg of our trip to Houston. It’s 10:00 a.m. on February 10, 2025, and boarding begins in 50 minutes. We’ve been planning this trip since my granddaughter-in-law “Phoebe” suggested around five months ago that we accompany her family – which includes my grandson “Drake” and their 8-year-old daughter “Katie” and their almost 3-year-old daughter “Daisy”- on a Disney cruise. This sounded wonderful, and there was an added benefit of spending a day before the cruise and a day after with Drake and Phoebe’s family in Houston.
This event was planned for the benefit of my two great granddaughters, of course. However, anything Disney has always appealed to me, so I’ve been looking forward to this trip with eager anticipation.
My mother-in-law loved to “rummage,” as she called it. Consequently, she gave me some strange “treasures” from time to time. One of them was a ship necklace – a sailing ship approximately 4″ x 5″ hanging from three chains. It’s been my custom to wear this necklace on a blue-and-white-striped shirt when I board a cruise ship, and I like to count the number of times people compliment me on it. On this cruise, the number was four – a lower number than usual, but a couple of them were really enthusiastic.
The last time we visited my grandson’s family, we took a walker to leave there for my use, rather than transport my rollator back and forth. I used this walker on the cruise, and it really didn’t hinder me at all. Normally, I try to walk 3,500 steps a day. During the cruise, I exceeded this number by quite a bit. The day we boarded, my daughter took us on a tour of the ship, and that day I walked 8,498 steps. Early on, little Daisy discovered that she could climb onto the walker seat and get a free ride, so most of those steps I took included pushing an extra thirty pounds. Daisy does not like elevators, and she let us know. I don’t especially care for them either, but had no choice because of my rollator. Actually, I have no problem with glass elevators, and the ship had both kinds. Daisy wanted no part of any kind of elevator, so Mom or Dad would take the stairs with her. In fact, our entire party preferred stairs – I did, too, back in the day.
We had warm weather on the cruise, a nice departure from the Oregon and Houston weather we’d been experiencing. On this cruise, the Disney Magic made one stop, at a Disney port in Progreso, Mexico. The only reason for departing the ship would be to buy souvenirs, and we certainly didn’t need any of those. We preferred staying on board where it was relatively quiet.
The first thing we did after boarding the Disney Magic was sit down to lunch, after which we toured the ship, as mentioned above. That evening we saw a show, the first of several we would see. All the shows were quite good, a mixture of film and live characters, and were based on familiar Disney movies. The cast of characters was excellent – very talented. I wanted to take the handsome prince home with me.
When planning this trip, my grandson and his wife were disappointed that most onboard activities were for children three and older. Daisy was two months shy of three, but the rule could not be bent. So we decided that the cruise was mainly for eight-year-old Katie, and Michelle and I felt it would be our mission to take Daisy under our wings to be sure that she would have a good time. We needn’t have worried. There were many activities that Daisy enjoyed. One time her parents dropped her off at the nursery, which she loved, but for the most part Mom or Dad or Grandma kept her busy. Michelle was always delighted to have grandma duty. Daisy’s Mommy or Daddy would participate in craft activities with her, resulting in our finding valentines and other gifts from Daisy on our doorstep. Meanwhile, Katie participated in the activities for her age group.
There were many pools, including a kiddy pool that was just perfect for Daisy – she loved spending time there. This cruise ship had two of those humongous pool tube slides. I told Michelle that the trip wouldn’t be complete for me until I got a photo of her on one of them. She obliged, and, with the help of the attendant who stood at the bottom, I got a video of Michelle ending her ride.
Remember the song from Annie, “Little Girls,” in which Miss Hannigan complains that while other women are dripping with diamonds and pearls, she’s dripping with little girls. This song constantly ran through my mind during the cruise. More appropriately, it should be “Little princesses.” I liked to say that you couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting a beautiful little princess. The big event for every little girl over three was a trip to the Bibbity-Bobbity Boutique where, for $250, she could have her hair done with a bun and a tiara, have make-up applied with a touch of glitter, and select a princess gown of her choice and a Mickey Mouse backpack – a happy coincidence because Katlie had already decided that she was going home with one of those backpacks. All of these little girls did look beautiful, and the hair stylings were lovely – until the girls went into a pool. Katie tried so hard to maintain her lovely coiffure while playing in the pool. She would swim a while, adjust her hair, and swim some more. After doing this a few times, she realized that the donut used to make the bun in her hair was gone, so she decided that she had no choice but to give up the glamorous hair and just have fun. I’m sure her hair donut had found a home in the pool filter along with many others.
My great granddaughters – and I’m sure most other little girls on the cruise – came on board with many princess dresses. If there happened to be any little girl who came without several princess dresses, there were many choices on the ship, so that she could go home with a complete princess wardrobe. Some little boys dressed appropriately for the occasion, but, let’s face it, the dress-up stuff was mainly for little girls.
We knew coming onto the Disney Magic that there was to be a Pirates’ Night. This was when the little boys finally had a chance to shine. There were adorable small pirates all over the place, with eye patches and hooks galore. Drake, Phoebe, and the girls had lovely costumes, and Michelle was a fetching wench. My costume consisted of a blue-and-white striped shirt over dark blue pants, with a red sash at the waist, and, to complete the outfit I wore on my head a pirate Mickey Mouse kerchief, compliments of the Disney Magic crew. Oh, and I began Pirates’ Night wearing the famous ship necklace, but during dinner we noticed that the necklace was shipwrecked – the ship had broken in two. My first reaction was that I would need to discard the necklace, but then I remembered that it had been broken and mended previously. So the ship necklace would be dry-docked until repairs could be made.
Ending a cruise is always a sad event, after days of fun; however, knowing we would spend a day in Houston with my grandson’s family before flying home made the end of the cruise easier to accept. We had an enjoyable time with the family. When asked to say goodbye to me, sweet little Daisy began to cry. That should have made me feel sad, but I was actually happy to see that she had bonded with me. I promised Katie that I would order some Girl Scout cookies, and we said our goodbyes.
The first leg of our trip home was Houston to Las Vegas. Before taking off for the second leg – from Las Vegas to Eugene, Oregon, there was some drama on the plane. A young lady sitting across the aisle from us and one row back had a fear of flying, so much so that she held a large garbage bag which she filled as she threw up multiple times. She was also crying. The pilot came and talked with her and the young man who was her travel companion, suggesting they take a later flight. She didn’t want to do that. The anti-anxiety medication she had taken had been thrown up, so she took more. Suffering from phobias myself, I was really empathetic toward her. I even found myself crying because I was so upset to see her in such a state. I wanted to take her in my arms and tell her that I understood, but, of course, I didn’t. The plane wasn’t full, so we were able to spread out. The pilot gave the ill young lady permission to lie down with her head on her companion’s lap, as long as she was wearing her seatbelt, which is just what she did, and she slept for the entire trip. As we left the plane, she looked well rested and happy.
Bob was waiting for Michelle and me when we landed in Eugene, and had hugs for his wife and mother-in-law. Turned out that Bob wasn’t the only one who missed us. Our dog Banjo greeted us with enthusiasm, letting us know how happy he was to see us, and we let him know that we’d missed him, too.
