The End

Well, I suppose I should wrap this up, now that I've been done with my program for a few weeks. In my defense, though, I broke my arm and it makes typing difficult, but I've got a shorter cast now that makes it a little easier to type.

My last week in the boutique was stressful, fun, and quick. On my second to last day of work, my bus never showed up and I ended up being a half hour late to work. I'd been given incorrect information and had been told that for CPs, if you didn't work exactly what they'd scheduled you for in your last week, it was grounds for automatic termination. So I showed up a half hour late, drenched because a thunderstorm hit while I was running in, still in my own clothes and in tears, thinking I was going to be terminated on my second to last day of work. Everyone in the stockroom helped dry me off and they called a manager for me to speak to, and we worked it all out--turns out it's a LIE that CPs get termed, it only applies to ICPs, and because the bus company wasn't reporting anything wrong with their buses that day, they couldn't remove it from my record card, but since it was my last day the next day, it didn't really matter.

My last day I was in tears again, but not for the same reason. It had finally hit as I was on the second bus to work that it was my very last day, and my closest coworkers were on the same bus as me and were already crying. Getting in my costume for the last time was hard, too. Everything was a "last" that I hadn't thought of until it was happening, so I wasn't quite prepared for how attached I'd actually become to some of the things we'd always complain about.

That day in the boutique was great. I had wonderful princesses, all of whom were sweethearts with wonderful hair. I was so happy because I got a princess with hair down to her waist that was so thick I couldn't wrap one hand around it, and she wanted it in a Fairytale Princess bun. Those are always my favorites. It takes more time and it's harder, but that was my favorite kind of hair to work with. It was always fun to see how surprised they were by how I could get all of their hair up into a bun that looked like it could only hold a fourth of their hair.

Halfway through the day, some of the FGITs called all of the FGITs who were celebrating their birthday to come up to the front. There were five of us all leaving that day, or "celebrating our 1000th birthday." We stood in the front and then they called all of the mothers in the boutique to come up and put a hand on our shoulder. The five of us held onto a pixie wand and they made us close our eyes as they announced to the boutique that since we were celebrating our 1000th birthday, it meant we were finally done with our training and that we were graduating from Fairy Godmother school. We were officially Fairy Godmothers and now it was time for us to go out into the world and find our very own princess, just as Cinderella's Fairy Godmother did. Then they had the mothers think of a wish to help us find our own princesses, and they pixie dusted us all.

Later that evening after we'd closed, there were only two princesses left in the boutique, and they did another graduation ceremony. This time they had us stand in front and they handed us our diplomas from the Fairy Godmother, which had a little bag of pixie dust attached. We also got Celebration buttons that said we were celebrating "earning our wands." Then we were pixie dusted again, this time MUCH more thoroughly, because by this point no one had a princess, so everyone grabbed a wand. My closest friends decided it'd be a great idea to empty an entire pixie dust wand on my head. It took a good three weeks to get it out of my hair, and I'm still finding it on some of my clothes.

My last princess was a sweetheart. I was so glad I got her. 1. She had beautiful, long, thick hair that was easy to work with, and 2. She was funny and talkative and believed all my stories. She was really polite, too, which was cute. Every time I told her something like, "I live in the castle, right upstairs!" or "I did Princess Ariel's hair today, did you know that?" she would get really excited and turn around in her chair to look at me. It was funny because I had to keep stopping since she turned around so much, which I would normally find annoying, but she wasn't doing it to peek, it was because she wanted me to keep telling her stories. At one point, there was a little pirate sitting in front of us, and he belonged to the princess beside us. I did my usual, "Oh no, a pirate! You be sure not to steal any princess jewels, you hear?" to which the little pirate responded, "I'm going to steal all of them!" Before I could even say anything, my princess said, "Sir, you shouldn't do that. Stealing isn't very nice, and only bad people do it." Then she looked at me and said, "I don't steal because I'm a princess and princesses are nice and already have enough jewels, so they don't need to steal any." I nearly died laughing, and I'm sure the queen will have a really shaky recording of it, because she was laughing really hard as she was filming.

That princess was the only princess who ever made me cry onstage, as well. I've teared up before, but made it backstage quickly enough, but not with this one. It wasn't anything sad, either. I was asking when her birthday was, and it had passed not too long ago, so I congratulated her and then said, "Princess, did you know that today is my birthday?" She got really excited for me and asked how old I was turning, to which I said, "I'm 1000 years old today. Do you know what that means?" I then told her how Fairy Godmothers-in-Training graduated from Fairy Godmother school when they turned 1000. By this point I had finished her hair and was just getting around to opening up her makeup palette, so I knelt down next to her chair and said, "Princess, I want you to remember that you are a very special princess, okay?" And she gave me the biggest smile I'd seen all summer and said, "Am I really special?" So I nodded and said, "Yes, you are my most special princess. And do you know why? Because, princess, you are my very last princess before I have to leave the castle and go out into the world to find a princess of my own." Then she got really excited and turned to her mom and shouted, "Mom! I'm a special princess! Did you hear? I'm her very last one!" And that's about when I started to cry, because then she turned to me again and said, "I never knew I was such a special princess." So I told her to never forget that she was my most special, and made a pinky promise with her that she'd always remember just how special she is. I'm sure she won't remember our pinky promise, nor will she remember that she was my last princess, and as she grows up, she'll learn that I'm not really a Fairy Godmother and that I wasn't graduating and leaving to find my own princess, but that I was really just an employee and it was my last day of work. But I hope that she at least remembers how special she felt at that moment, and remembers that she is a special princess.

At the end, I asked if I could take a picture with her, and she gave me a big hug, which, of course, got me crying again. When that family looks back on their home video, they're going to see me crying on there quite a few times. The queen recorded the entire forty minutes I spent with her princess. I kind of wish I could somehow get a copy of that one. :)

Afterward I had to empty out my locker, which was difficult, and then I had to return all of my costumes for good, which was even more difficult. It was amazing how hard it was to let my headpiece go. We then left and everyone went to Bdubs to celebrate our last night, which was a lot of fun.

The next day was my last day in the parks, which was, I can say without a doubt, the best day of my summer. I went to every park that day, from opening to closing, and didn't allow myself to think of how I was leaving early the next morning. I saw the Festival of the Lion King, which I bawled throughout, and took pictures with Thumper, Miss Bunny, and Pocahontas. I went on the Kilimanjaro Safari, took a picture with our driver, went on Dinosaur and Mt. Everest. Sarah and Kelly Jo, my two closest friends, came with me. After Animal Kingdom, we went to the Magic Kingdom. Sarah had to leave then for her shift, and Kelly Jo and I went on Space Mountain, Stitch's Great Escape, and Splash Mountain. Then we watched the Celebrate A Dream Come True parade, which I had never been able to watch before because I was always working during it. I was wearing my tiara and my Celebrate button, and I was still covered in pixie dust, so characters kept congratulating me. Tiana leaned over the edge of her float to ask what I was celebrating and then applauded me for graduating from Fairy Godmother school, since she actually knew what "earning my wand" meant. Captain Hook kissed the back of my hand and told me to call him, and one of Cinderella's mice bowed and kissed my hand.

Afterward we watched Dream Along with Mickey, which is a show on a stage right in front of the castle. I'd never been able to watch the entire thing in one go before, but I always heard it as I came into work. I ran into Bri there, and right after the show we watched the Move It, Shake It, Celebrate It parade. This parade is highly underrated, in my opinion. It's a parade that stops in front of the castle and then you get to come into the street and dance with the characters. I think its a wonderful opportunity for little kids. Bri and I danced with Mr. Incredible and a stilt-walker. Then we all headed into the boutique for more pixie dust and face jewels. It was the first time Bri had ever been pixie dusted, so she was super excited. I went around and said my last goodbyes to those who were working and took a few last pictures before heading over to Epcot. We just did a quick walk through of Epcot, and as we were walking, a thunderstorm hit, so I ran around in the rain one last time. It was wonderful. I'd been hoping I would get one last thunderstorm on my last day.

Afterward we headed over to Hollywood Studios, but Kelly Jo had to leave so she could get some rest before her 12 hour shift the next day. We said our goodbyes, and by then Sarah had gotten off work, so she met me in the park and we started off with the Rock n' Glow Dance Party, which is always fun. I danced with Chip and Dale and Pluto, and we had fun singing along with a band called Mulch, Sweat, n' Shears that I've seen many times throughout the summer. Then we met up with another coworker, Maritza, whom I've always loved. She was there with her mother and nephew, and Kai, her nephew had never been there before. He wanted to go on the Tower of Terror for the first time, but Maritza was terrified of the ride, so we took him on with us. He hated it. He didn't say anything the whole time and when we got off, we asked him how it was and he just said, "It's scary!" Maritza laughed her head off and told him to man up, but at least he survived. We were going to watch Fantasmic after that, but they canceled it due to technical problems. I was really upset, but we ended up just going back to the Rock n' Glow Dance Party for the last of it, and we found out it was actually the last one of the summer. At the end we met the band members of Mulch, Sweat, n' Shears, and took pictures with them. By then the park had closed, so we headed out to the buses and we went home. I said my goodbyes, and then spent the rest of the night packing with my roommates. We got up early the next morning and headed straight to the airport.

And now I'm back in Utah. I actually really miss the heat and humidity of Florida, which surprises me, because I usually liked the dryness of Utah. But I definitely didn't miss these brown mountains, and now I find myself missing the green swamps around Disney and the thunderstorms and the cicadas and the humidity. I definitely miss being able to go into the parks whenever I wanted. It was a tiring and stressful job, and I wasn't getting paid nearly enough, but overall, I miss it. It was a wonderful experience, and I may just end up going back next summer. One of my coworkers said to me before I left, "You can hate the job all you want for your entire program, but on the last day when you leave and you realize that it was all worth it, you'll end up coming right back to Disney and you'll never leave." And I think it's true. I was tired and sore and stressed and grumpy a lot of the time. I had to deal with some of the most illogical, insane guests ever. But in the end, I miss working with all those little kids, all the little princesses. I miss seeing the smiles I could get from telling some silly tale that's clearly fake, and even though the grown adults knew it wasn't real, their smiles showed how much they appreciated all the stories we'd tell and all the work we did. Even something small that wasn't technically even part of my job, like asking if a family wanted me to take a picture of them all when the King was trying to get a shot of the others. Those little things earned such wonderful smiles and thanks for just taking a simple picture.

I remember one time I was just walking to one of the cast member exits for my tea, and I saw a little pirate from the Pirate's League. I stopped and screamed, and shouted, "You scared me! You're very scary looking, you know? Just make sure you don't go stealing anything from Cinderella's castle, okay? There are a lot of little princesses around here, so you better behave yourself." The little pirate just laughed and waved his sword around, promising not to steal anything. And then as I waved and told him to have a magical day, a passing lady stopped me and said, "That was the cutest thing I've ever seen." I just shrugged and said, "well, you know, those pirates just like to cause trouble. And those skull pirates, well, they're just plain scary! They always make me jump. You can never be too careful around pirates. But now I must be off--the Fairy Godmother has invited me to tea! Have a wonderful day!" The lady just laughed and told me I was wonderful, then I left for my tea. I don't even know why I remember that one so well, there are plenty of other instances where something bigger happened, but maybe it was because someone involved told me that what I was doing was making an impact. Not in so many words, but I think it was one of the first times I realized that a lot of these guests would probably remember something I said or did for a while, and even if they didn't, they'd at least feel special for that moment.

And on that note, I believe that about wraps it up. Now that I'm back at school, I feel like a fish out of water. It's odd walking around campus. I still feel like I should be walking in the utilidoor and changing into my costume. I'd like to go back next summer, but we'll see where I end up. Even if I don't go back, I'm at least glad I got this summer to have the amazing experiences I did.