This entire weekend has been an outing in departure and loss.
First I went down to Florida for the last official night of the Adventurers Club. Make no mistake that there were many positives. First and foremost, seeing cast members both old and new who have become genuine friends of the family. Meeting fellow supporters of the club who came as early as 9 AM to make sure they would be able to get in when the doors opened at 6 PM. Not to mention seeing characters who are either rarely seen (Madame Zarkov, the gypsy fortune teller) or haven't been around since the very earliest days (Marcel, gorilla downstairs butler) or who have never been seen before (the oft paged but never introduced until last night member Sutter Bestwick). And of course there were the shows in the library which usually wrap up around midnight but in this case went until past two in the morning. Frankly, if they were still going right now, as of this writing, I suspect that people would still be packed into the library, ready to stay until cast members were hoarse and crumbling, like Jimmy Stewart in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington."
Then there was the startling twist engineered by the audience in which the usual winner of the club's Balderdash cup, out-of-towner naif Emil, lost out as the audience--by popular acclaim--awarded the cup to the club's dyspeptic icthyologist and perpetual loser, Otis T. Wren. It was so unexpected that some characters referred, out of habit, to Emil as Adventurer of the Year even though Wren had wrested that honor away from him. A classic case of he who laughs last laughs best. Some of it stemmed from the popularity of the actor playing Otis, and some of it--I think--was from the desire to protest against The Way Things Are. Because The Way Things Are is the reason that the Club is closing in the first place.
Downside of the evening was the crush--literally, the crush--of people in attendance. The word "filled to capacity" was taken literally. You couldn't move. Literally. Couldn't move. In order to get into the Final Hoopla, the last show, I stood pretty much in one place for two and a quarter hours, losing hydration, feeling in my legs, and my temper in the face of one jackass who seemed to be involved in a personal challenge to see how much of a jerk he could be by insulting or picking fights with everyone around him.
And there was the overall frustration that Disney was letting a great thing slip through its fingers by allowing the Club to go away. The evening was rife with rumors over plans to save the place, but at the moment that's all they were: Rumors. Technically the Club isn't done; they have private parties and conventions booked through the end of January. So as long as there's life, I suppose, there's hope.
But there is no longer any life in the Mets. Over their last three games they scored a grand total of five runs. It didn't cost them yesterday but it ended their season today. I rushed back from Florida to be able to see the closing ceremonies on TV, hoping that I wouldn't be seeing the end of their season as well. That turned out not to be the case as Florida followed me back to NY and, for the second year in a row, ended the Mets season. Except they didn't really; the Mets did it to themselves. A game with little run production and a bullpen that couldn't hold the other team back. Howard Johnson, the Mets hitting coach, looked grim as he walked out for the closing ceremonies. Small wonder. He may well be out of a job. When the offense doesn't get it done, they endanger the job security of the guy who's supposed to help them get it done. How can you attribute anything special to the Marlins when we've seen this particular scenario game after game after game against all different teams? A sour and bitter send-out of Shea Stadium, which is going to be torn down and replaced with a field that serves as a gigantic corporate sponsorship.
So basically it was a weekend of loss. Losing the Adventurers Club, losing the season, losing Shea Stadium. I suppose we should count our blessings: At least it's Citifield, not WaMufield.
I know I'm supposed to feel upbeat for all the memories. But memories fade. Sometimes they're even cruelly stolen by the ravages of age. What frustrates me is that when things go away, others don't get to experience them. There was a young woman at the Adventurers Club who was in her twenties, talked about how she had been coming to the Club since she was five, and was there with her three year old daughter. Yes, the woman has her memories. But her daughter won't. Nor will Caroline.
The past is fine, but disheartening when there's no future.
PAD
Posted by Peter David at September 28, 2008 05:34 PM | TrackBack | Other blogs commentingPeter, I'm very sorry that things didn't work out as you and other AC fans would've hoped.
You did your best to try and save it. Sadly, for both people and corporations, it's sometimes the most difficult to get them to do what is most obviously the wisest choice.
Deleted by PAD because this is THE WRONG WEEKEND TO SCREW WITH ME. ANYONE ELSE WANT TO BE A SMART ASS?
PAD, apologies for going off-topic, but can you let Glenn know that for some of us, the main page of the blog is loading REALLY slowly, and is using up so much memory that it occasionally freezes up our system? I'm using IE7 with XP and 512MB RAM. It may be the ComicMix widget that's causing it.
Kungaloosh! Perhaps an annual reunion event can be created by the fans
I was there on Wednesday, but not brave enough to fight those crowds on Saturday. I kept hoping to hear Bob Iger showed up and saved the day... Ah well.
Kungaloosh!
Man thats really sad, I have never been there but from all the amazing things from what I heard about it, it was seriously a place that wont ever be truly replaced and I wish I could have been there atleast once. I think back to this last summer, my brother and I flew to Vegas for 4 days and the whole sole purpose for the trip was to have the best time at Star Trek The Experience. So for 3 nights we went on the rides, and ate at Quarks bar. That place will be the only place ever where you can sit at a bar drinking a Romulan ale or a James "Tea" Kirk (a huge Long Island blue drink with Dry Ice smoke coming out of it) and where you can watch Star Trek---First Contact was on when we were there one time and I can remember being crazy happy. It was a true Trekker experience, and if the Adventurers Club was anything like or better than Star Trek The Experience then the World has just lost a great place...
Otis won!?! I wish I'd been there for that! Then again, I don't think I'd have patience for the crowd. It was standing room only when I was there in August, and that was crowded enough for me.
I'm glad you were able to be there for the last day, PAD, despite dehydration and numb feet.
Having not been there myself, I can't much relate, but I can tell how much it means to you and I am sorry about the loss. May the memories last as long as possible.
I'm kind of kicking myself for not going to this place when I was at Disney World for my honeymoon three years ago. I'd never even heard of the place until you started writing about it.
Peter, I don't wish to bait you (or any Mets fans) by bringing up the Yankees (maybe that's not even an issue this year), but I think Derek Jeter's words at the final Yankee Stadium game ring true:
"Now the great thing about memories is you're able to pass it along from generation to generation... Now the great thing about memories is you're able to pass it along from generation to generation.
Take your memories of Shea and pass them along to your kids. You're a writer - write them down!Games you watched on TV and attended. Pictures you took. Buy the commemorative DVD if you like. Memories do fade, but as a storyteller you should realize that the way to immortalize them is by keeping them alive through stories and passing them down, down, down.
Peter, I don't wish to bait you (or any Mets fans) by bringing up the Yankees (maybe that's not even an issue this year), but I think Derek Jeter's words at the final Yankee Stadium game ring true:
"Now the great thing about memories is you're able to pass it along from generation to generation...We're relying on you to take the memories from this stadium and add them to the new memories that come to the new Yankee Stadium, and continue to pass them on from generation to generation"
Take your memories of Shea and pass them along to your kids. You're a writer - write them down!Games you watched on TV and attended. Pictures you took. Buy the commemorative DVD if you like. Memories do fade, but as a storyteller you should realize that the way to immortalize them is by keeping them alive through stories and passing them down, down, down.
1Jim Hill Media has an article about the final night with some nice pics. Just thought I'd let everyone know.
Phillies/Brewers? I have no one to root for. Let's go Joe Torre and the Dodgers.
Thinking about memory and loss...
First, this melancholy may perhaps be alleviated by repeated viewings of the Discovery Channel commercial "The World Is Just Awesome."
I do have a point. You got me thinking of things I didn't get to see by virtue of when and where I was born and where I've lived and all that. You're thinking of what you won't be able to show directly to Caroline, and I can understand that feeling. But you and Kathleen do seem like you make an effort to Share The Cool (sounds like a slogan), so you're actively building Caroline's memories of cool things that happened when she was a kid. You'll keep doing that, into her teens and beyond, because of course parents should help their kids' lives be neater. Many things in this world are cool and memorable. Many other things were cool and memorable -- go way way back to, say, the giant lighthouse at Alexandria or the Babylonian Hanging Gardens, to take the idea to an extreme -- and if we can't have direct memories of those we should do our best to have direct memories of what's in the world now. (I'm no baseball fan. and even I was moved by the Red Sox finally winning in 2004. See? Awesomeness can be found!)
I do hope you feel better, Peter.
Unrelated P.S.: I've started reading and enjoying Tigerheart. I keep hearing the narration sounding like Jim Dale from "Pushing Daisies."
Speaking as a Wisconsinite and a Brewers fan, I have to admit I'm not *too* broken up about the Mets loss, but from a fan of one team that can never catch a break to another, I feel for the Mets fans. For what it's worth, Milwaukeeans have been playoff-free for 26 years (!) and we needed a jolt of faith in our MLB team, plus I'm fairly certain Philly is going to spank us out of the playoffs anyway (but I'll get to find out in person on Saturday!). It might be another 26 years before it happens again (especially if Sabathia and Sheets are gone next season), so hopefully Mets fans can take some comfort in what this means to my state.
I'd been to Disney World any number of times as a kid, but had never heard of the AC until Peter started posting about its closing. It sounded like a fun and unique entertainment, and I regret I will not have the option to experience it should I ever return to Disney World as an adult.
PAD,
Sorry for your "weekend of loss". Definitely the Adventurers Club part. I guess all I can say is, "Have faith. It will be coming back through the efforts of people like you. If it doesn't, well, you can be thankful for your memories,"
Best of luck,
Jerome