Anonymous: why is disney so important for you?

I’ve been looking at this question over and over since it dropped in earlier this afternoon. People have asked me the same thing in the past and I’ve always been able to answer pretty swiftly, but for some reason, I feel like I should go into more depth. 

Like most kids, I grew up watching Disney. The movies were a source of entertainment for me, just like everyone else. I loved the magic and the music and the romance and the heroes and heroines and the funny sidekicks as much as the next kid. And even as I breached the ‘appropriate’ age for liking Disney, and stopped watching the movies, it always held a special place in my heart, you know? Like a stuffed animal that you keep on a shelf but don’t necessarily sleep with anymore. It’s there, and you remember it fondly, but you grow up, because everyone tells you that you have to.

Middle school chronicled the more awful parts of my life - there was a lot a moving going on, switching schools, my mom getting remarried, all while I was in the midst of puberty, no longer a cute little girl but not yet a young woman. I was awkward looking and weird and didn’t have a lot of friends. To say that I loved Disney movies at that time in my life would have meant social suicide, and I was already at the bottom of the ladder. So I pushed childhood behind me and tried to be ‘cool’. I lived in Tennessee in sixth grade for a few months and I am not at all exaggerating when I say that I had no friends. None. Zip. I was there for about a semester and did not befriend a single person. On accident, in a moment of serendipity, you might say, I stumbled upon Treasure Planet in my step-dad’s massive collection of movies. Not knowing what it was, but familiar with the iconic Disney logo, I threw it into the DVD player (we had no cable) and watched it by myself. That movie by itself means so much to me (which I won’t go into here) but that’s what rekindled my love for Disney movies. 

It was limited to just Treasure Planet for a long time - mostly because I didn’t have access to any other movies. My mom had long since given our tapes away and at the time, I wasn’t savvy enough with the internet to find the movies I wanted. It wasn’t until high school, when I moved to Michigan as a sophomore, that my Disney thing (obsession, passion, what have you) really started to bloom.

I hate to say that I don’t really remember how it started. I’m sure it began on one of my frequent visits to Goodwill, which, thank the gods, always has VHS’s. I’ve always loved the way a VHS tape feels, the way the box looks; it was all very nostalgic for me, so I probably just went on a whim and bought one (I’m pretty sure the first VHS I bought was The Lion King) and it just sky-rocketed from there. The tapes are cheap and I have yet to come across a damaged one, and as my collection grew, so did my long-lost love for Disney (and other animated films). 

Because Disney primarily makes films for children, the deeper meanings and messages in their films are often lost. I know I didn’t fully understand the weight of the lessons I was being taught when I was a kid. I was in it for the pretty princesses (which is also a whole other story) and the fart jokes (thank you, Pumbaa). But watching them now, as a young adult, I understand them so much more. I appreciate the characters and the story and the love and the morals that Disney teaches.

I’m not saying Disney is this flawless company with zero mistakes, but I think it’s this quality that makes the company so human and easy to relate to. They’re growing and changing and trying to understand society just like the rest of us and doing the best they can to not only entertain us, but teach us, too.

Disney comforts me. Disney has created worlds that I can revisit whenever I want. Excuse the completely creepy phrase I’m about to use, but Disney has given me friends - heroes, people I look up to. It doesn’t matter to me at all that they’re fictional because, in my opinion, that does not stop them from being real.

Disney is for the kid in all of us, and just because I get older doesn’t mean I have to grow up.