Niles: Lessons endure after Disney closes a favorite ride
Walt Disney World has closed the attraction where I learned one of the more important lessons of my life.
Disney has closed its Tom Sawyer Island and surrounding Rivers of America in Florida, after 52 years of operation at the Magic Kingdom. The attractions remain open at Disneyland and Tokyo Disneyland. I drove the rafts to Florida’s Tom Sawyer Island for parts of four years while I was in college and graduate school.
Tom Sawyer Island was my favorite Walt Disney World attraction as a child and my favorite ride to work as a cast member. But I did not enjoy driving those rafts when I started. They frustrated me.
My trainer had given me instructions how to steer the raft by pulling or pushing its tiller when I reached specific viewpoints on the river. Yet that training left me adrift if I missed just one of those steps at any point in my journey. After watching me struggle for a couple of days, a supervisor assigned me another trainer. Before the park opened to guests, he took me out onto the middle of the river, motioned me to the tiller and said the words that I now live by.
“Quit thinking and just drive the raft.”
I did not need a laundry list of turn-by-turn instructions. I needed to know how to drive the raft — how it responded when I applied the throttle and the tiller. So I drove the raft all the way around the island, turning 360 degrees wherever I wanted, so I could get to know the feel of the raft.
It’s the difference between training and knowledge. Thinking about a checklist left me ill-equipped to adapt when I needed to. Knowing that raft to be point where I could steer it by reflex allowed me to drive across the river swiftly and consistently, with time to chat up the guests aboard.
I thought of that lesson again six months ago this week, when I had to drive my family away from the approaching Eaton Fire in Pasadena. With blinding smoke filling the air and hurricane-force winds blowing down trees and power lines, blocking roads without notice, this was no time to rely on an online map’s instructions.
Fortunately, I knew my community. Reflex guided me down surface streets as freeways clogged and new obstacles suddenly blocked our way. I quit thinking and just drove the car, responding to and avoiding the chaos around us.
Entertainment productions, including theme park attractions, might not seem important as the world around us burns, figuratively and literally. But entertainment offers lessons that can help build the character we need to overcome those challenges.
I will miss “my” Tom Sawyer Island, but I never will forget its lessons for me. Study and work until your knowledge becomes instinct. Know your surroundings so that you can respond to any change or challenge. Above all, always help the people around you when they struggle.
No matter what happens to the river, just keep driving that raft.