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1---
2title: Something
3subtitle: about my tenure as a bear
4genre: prose
5
6id: dollywood
7toc: "Something about my tenure as a bear"
8
9project:
10 title: Autocento of the breakfast table
11 class: autocento
12...
13
14I turned off the TV as soon as the end credits began.
15I stretched in the La-Z-Boy™ I grew up in, pushing its back until I lay horizontal, feet slightly elevated.
16I stared at the light, at the bugs silhouetted inside it.
17I relaxed, thought about sleeping in the chair with the light on.
18I decided against it, pulled the lever to pull the chairback up and the footrest down, stood up, went around the corner, turned off the light, [stripped to my underwear][], and got [in bed][].
19I made sure my alarm was set for 8:00 and lay face-up in the dark.
20Eventually I slept.
21
22I still consider this to be the best summer I ever had, in terms of my sleep schedule.
23Every night I went to bed at midnight, after Stewart and Colbert.
24Every morning I woke up at eight, took a shower, ate my Frosted Mini-Wheats™, and brushed my teeth.
25I took my time because I didn't have to leave for work until 9:30.
26My shift at Dollywood started at 10:00.
27It was my second summer there---I worked as Larry the Cucumber™ mostly, though sometimes I would pick up the shift for one of the official Dollywood mascots when they had their day off.
28
29I went outside when the wall clock read 9:32.
30The day was already beginning to warm up.
31I walked across the road to my car, a Saturn®, my first, started it, pulled into the road, and looked up at my window, the only one on the second floor of my house.
32I said "So long" [in my head][] to my room, the house, and my two sisters still sleeping inside, and drove down the road.
33
34***
35
36My morning commute was rural, through farms, creeks, hills, and hollows; past tourist cabin resorts and used Christian bookstores; nearly getting to Pigeon Forge but stopping before any of the Strip was visible.
37Like Las Vegas, Pigeon Forge has a Strip; it was second only to Vegas in terms of marriages performed; it was first in the country including Vegas to feature two Cracker Barrels®.
38I went into Pigeon Forge only if I couldn't help it, which was rare; usually it was only if family from out-of-state were visiting, or the one time I and two friends went to the Buy-One-Pair-Get-Two-Pair-Free Boot Store and got a deal.
39
40I turned left before I got to any of Pigeon Forge, into the employee entrance of Dollywood.
41I drove down a small road: to my left a hill covered in kudzu; to my right a fence past which I could hear people riding The River Rampage™ or Rockin' Roadway™.
42I turned left again, drove past HR and the Dollywood doctor's office, and checked for parking at the bottom of the hill.
43There wasn't any, so I drove up the hill, found a parking spot, and got out of my car.
44I thought about waiting for an employee shuttle until I realized it was 9:55, so I trotted down the hill and past HR.
45I crossed the road in front of the gazebo, walked down a little path, and met Tim the security guard as I was crossing the main road.
46He asked to see my ID, which I had ready for him.
47I showed it to him, he looked me up and down (I wasn't in costume, usually a no at Dollywood, but since my costume was green, expensive, and required at least two people to put on, I didn't have to wear it onto the park), and finally let me through.
48I walked through the employee entrance and clocked in at 9:58.
49
50I had only figured out how to clock in my second summer.
51The first summer I worked at Dollywood was also the first summer I worked a job, and due to the placement of the Atmosphere Characters in the hierarchy of Park management we got paid by the day.
52This confused me into thinking that I didn't need to clock in and out, especially since I still got paid.
53My confusion deepened when I walked onto Park one day with Chance, who also worked Veggie Tales™, and he clocked in, but this was midway through the summer and I was too nervous to ask anyone about what I should do.
54I was worried that if I started clocking in it would cause suspicion, and I was terrified that my not clocking in would be caught and punished somehow.
55For about a month I lived in mild terror each morning and afternoon, avoiding my coworkers as they entered or left so they wouldn't see me walk past the red time clocks, each day wondering if the hammer would fall.
56I found out later that my manager Charlie had been paying me based on the days he'd scheduled me, clocking me in and out himself from his computer.
57He said it wasn't a big deal but to clock in next summer, this summer.
58So I clocked in and out every day, and these short sessions with the red time clock became favorite moments.
59
60I walked onto the park, past Jukebox Junction™, over the bridge, under the rope that disallowed guests to visit the area until the Park opened at 10:00, down Showstreet, and into the back of Showstreet Palace Theater, where we characters shared a dressing room with the Veggie Tales™ actors.
61Our "dressing-room" was a part of backstage partitioned off by curtains, where the empty shells of Bob the Tomato™ and Larry the Cucumber™ lay, inside-out so the sweat inside could evaporate, between shifts.
62I grabbed my off-brand UnderArmour™ "slicks" from the laundry basket and went to the bathroom to change.
63
64After I changed I came out of the bathroom and knocked on the women's dressing room door, to see if Nina or Stacy were in yet.
65Nina opened the door.
66"Hey Case," she said. "How's it going?"
67"I'm good. Am I Larry today?"
68I had been off the day before, so I wasn't sure of the rotation.
69"Yeah I think so," said Stacy, putting on makeup in the mirror.
70So she was handling with Chance, while Nina and I were the vegetables.
71I liked this arrangement; I preferred to be Larry™ because I didn't have to talk to anyone, and I could make faces in the costume while families took pictures.
72Nina preferred the same thing, although she was slightly too tall to fit comfortably inside Bob™.
73Stacy actually preferred to handle; her personality was bubbly and talkative; I don't think Chance liked any part of the job, really, and handling was less hot than being in the suit.
74
75"When's our first run?" I asked.
76"Well, the first show is at 10:20, so we were thinking about 11?"
77I nodded.
78"Where's Chance?"
79"I think he went out back to smoke," Nina said.
80"I'll go with you."
81The actors for the Veggie Tales show were coming in to use their dressing room, so we left Stacy with them.
82We walked through backstage, behind all the curtains, and through the side door into a sort of garage with ratty couches, a refrigerator, and an old TV mounted high up on the wall.
83Chance was sitting, smoking, and watching Jeopardy while thumbing through a magazine.
84"Hi Chance," I said.
85"Hey guys!" he flicked his smile, always somewhere between genuine and mocking, at us.
86
87"Think it'll rain today?"
88he asked, indicating the direction of the sky.
89It wasn't really visible from within the garage, due to the high fence keeping the guests on the path toward Timber Tower™ and Mystery Mine™, and the tree just outside the garage.
90"I don't think there's a cloud in the sky," I said, but walked out of the garage and looked up to be sure.
91There were wisps of cirrus like stray brush strokes on a blue canvas, but that was all.
92"I think we'll have to do all of our runs today."
93"Damn," said Chance, and stubbed out his cigarette.
94We watched Jeopardy in silence for a few minutes.
95Chance checked his watch.
96"It's 10:19," he said, "we should get inside before the show starts."
97
98We went back to the dressing room, behind the curtains backstage, past the skins of Larry™ and Bob™, their feet, and their battery packs, past the water fountain where I drank, and into the women's dressing room.
99Stacy had finished applying her makeup and was already in overalls, flannel, boots and cowboy hat.
100Seeing her, Chance said, "I'd better go put my outfit on."
101He left and came back, costumed.
102We killed time.
103Nina turned her wrist and looked at her watch.
104"It's 10:50," she said, looking at me and jerking her head toward the door.
105"Let's get ready."
106
107We went out and down the hall.
108The Veggie Tales were singing about Mr. Nezzer™ loving the bunny.
109Nina went to Bob™, and I to Larry™.
110We set to work pulling them right-side-out.
111When this was done we put on the backpacks that served as interior shells for the characters and held the battery packs.
112As Nina pulled on Bob™'s legs, I pulled on Larry™'s.
113I put my shoes in Larry™'s feet---a concession made to the forms of us humans inside the suits (Bob™ and Larry™ on the show had no arms or legs).
114We clipped each other's batteries into the packs.
115We put our hands through the vegetables' arms.
116At this point, the vegetables' faces were sagging from our waists, like deflated balloons.
117We waddled over to the hallway outside the dressing rooms.
118Chance helped me put Larry's hands on, which were three-fingered like a cartoon, although in the cartoon the Veggie Tales characters don't have hands.
119He snapped them onto the arm.
120He helped me pull the head up and over my pack, and clipped the battery to the fan inside the suit.
121He zipped the back zipper, and the suit started to inflate---Bob™ and Larry™ were inflatable to cut down on their weight.
122Stacy had done the same with Nina and Bob™.
123She asked, "Ready?"
124We said, "Ready."
125Chance got ahead of us, opening the door.
126I had to push my hands into my chest to deflate the suit so it could fit through the door.
127We stepped into the dappled sunlight of Dollywood.
128
129***
130
131The first few minutes of the run were fairly peaceful.
132A few families walking by saw us and walk over, forming a small line for their children to say hello, get a hug and a picture.
133One of the kids, about three, got about five feet from me, pass some sort of magic barrier, and suddenly become terrified.
134She screamed and run back to her parents.
135I tried to get eye-contact (it was hard to tell exactly where Larry™ was looking, since his eyes were about a foot above my head and were fixed forward), get small, and hold out my hand, but she had seen quite enough.
136She shook her head and hid behind her mother's leg.
137I waved with my fingers and stepped back to receive the next child.
138
139Sometimes, doing this job, I felt like a priest giving some sort of communion.
140Sometimes I felt like a celebrity, especially when children asked for an autograph (this happened fairly often, and Chance had to guide my hand with the Sharpie™ in it).
141Sometimes I felt like Santa Claus, or some other mythical creature come to Earth.
142Mostly, I felt a little hot and slightly bored.
143The boredom crystallized into stress when the Veggie Tales show let out.
144
145Showstreet Palace held something like four hundred people, and for a show like Veggie Tales, around half were children.
146For this run our post was around the side of the theater, so we didn't get the full press of the crowd, but there were quite a few people streaming out of the side door, fresh from seeing Larry™, Bob™ and friends performing in a show.
147Of course they were excited to see them giving out hugs in the street.
148Chance and Stacy became busy trying to form the crowd into some semblance of a line while I and Nina were hugging children, trying to take our time with each but painfully aware of the next in line.
149This was the worst part of the job---I felt like I was on a factory line gluing widgets onto a product all day.
150I was always looking ahead, always at the next kid, barely noticing what the ones old enough to talk were saying to me, trying to show me.
151I felt callous and aloof from humanity, and a deep unease passed over me.
152
153With all of this on my mind, of course I didn't see the teenager running toward me from my left.
154Chance and Stacy can't be blamed; they were busy with crowd control.
155I don't know what happened to the kid afterward.
156All I know is what happened to me: suddenly a great weight on my left side, the hiss of air being forced out of Larry™, me almost falling over.
157The weight fell off.
158I turned around, too stunned to yell, though Chance had caught it out of the corner of his eye.
159"Hey! Don't do that!" he said, his eyes on the fallen teenager.
160The kid was maybe fifteen, tall, with a white T-shirt and dark hair.
161He had an indescribable look on his face---surprise, satisfaction, and something else I couldn't identify.
162Before Chance could reach him he ran off.
163
164"You okay?"
165he turned to me and asked.
166I said in a low voice, "Yeah I'm fine."
167"We're going in," he said to Stacy.
168She checked her watch, said, "Yeah, it's been twenty minutes."
169To the crowd: "We have time for just two more pictures!"
170A wave of disappointment went through the people there.
171Most stayed, hoping for an extension of the rule, but we took two more pictures, turned around, and began walking inside.
172Some family tried to follow us in; Chance hollered over his shoulder, "I'm sorry folks, we have to go in.
173Bob™ and Larry™ need a break."
174The father asked, "When will you be back out?"
175"After the next show," Chance said as Stacy opened the door.
176
177I deflated Larry™'s face again, to get in the door, and was safe in the darkness of the hallway.
178Chance unzipped me, allowing real, cool air to wash over my body.
179Nina and I waddled down the hallway to peel the vegetables off ourselves, and to repeat the process of waiting, dressing, and standing again.
180
181[stripped to my underwear]: underwear.html
182[in bed]: in-bed.html
183[in my head]: hymnal.html