Two Girls, a Kingdom and a Talking Mouse

Once upon a time, I worked in a magical place. There you could ride abandoned mine trains, blast off with space rangers, and go under the sea with your favorite mermaid. Like any fairytale heroine, I was overworked and underpaid. I worked long hours, making sure the people around me were having a magical time, while I was pretty miserable. I had moved there for a new opportunity, but was now suffering. I disliked my roommates, and struggled to connect and meet people who shared my cynicism.

Most people in this kingdom seemed to all have the same thoughts; that this place was magical, nothing could go wrong, and even though we were underpaid, overworked, and often spit on (yes, I was spit on at work but that’s another tale).They believed that our overlords truly cared about us and we were here to make magic. In my role in the kingdom, I would hang out with the characters. I was the one that the princesses relied on to let them know when they could go take a break, or help to get the guests ready to meet their favorite royal. Now I didn’t always work with princesses, sometimes I worked with furry friends, country bears, and your favorite toys. Any day could bring a new set of challenges to expect.

In some meet and greet locations, you needed special training. Most of the time that meant that there was an additional layer of technology added to the experience. One such location involved a talking mouse. One who normally never spoke during his meet and greets. In this location, he was a magician. He could perform some magic tricks for guests, or he could have the guests perform a fun activity with him. He might even speak in a foreign language. He was a technological marvel that impressed guests, but was a nightmare to actually work that location.

When I first became an attendant I was not speciality trained in any locations. Once you are there for a couple months they normally begin to work in some special training, but you have to sign up for what locations you wanted. Now, after to talking to some of my fellow attendants I realized that this talking mouse location was terrible and I didn’t want to be trained there. Shortly after I had passed on my special training, the company announced that in May of coming year the venue would be closing, and our talking mouse would no longer talk. Perfect! Amazing! I don’t ever have to worry about working that trash fire of a location. Sike!

Cut to a couple weeks later, I receive a call stating that starting in January I would be trained for this talking mouse venue. Why were they training a bunch of people to work a venue that would close in a couple months? Well they were hemorrhaging cast members at this location, and couldn’t keep it staffed. They desperately needed people trained in this location. Hey, at least it meant more hours for me.

I was absolutely dreading this training. I was going to have to learn about this dumb venue and be forced to interact with fellow cast members, which to my social anxiety filled brain is a form of torture. I figured I’ll power through it, I can make small talk, and it will only be five days. I was so wrong. The training still sucked, but I ended up meeting the best person.

In the television show Grey’s Anatomy, there are two characters Meredith and Christina. They are close friends, have gone through hell, and have discovered themselves together. They refer to each other as their “person”. Cristina says at one point, “If I murdered someone, she’s the person I’d call to help drag the corpse across the living room floor.” That’s Katie. She’s my person. It so perfectly encapsulates our friendship. I don’t believe your soulmate has to be a romantic partner. My soul mate is my best friend, and that talking mouse brought us together.

First day of training, there are 6 of us, we sit is a conference/classroom in one of the office buildings offsite. There is a lengthy powerpoint presentation, we are given a learning guide of all the scenarios and interactions that the mouse could possibly do. In the corner, the entire time our training is happening, sits the talking mouse’s head on a pike and every once in a while he opens his mouth and spits out a phrase. It is terrifying! There really isn’t much time to interact with my fellow attendants, and at the time I was grateful for that. Second day of training is pretty much identical to the first. Though I do get to spend some more time with my other trainees, there is one guy who is incredibly annoying, and there’s this one girl who seems pretty great. I didn’t want to get my hopes up though. Third day of training is when the magic really starts to happen. We were now at the venue, in a spare meet and greet room. The talking mouse’s head is once again on a pike in the corner of the room. We have performers helping out so we can see how he would normally move about the room. Our third and fourth day of training was just going to be mock meet and greets, so that each attendant can get comfortable with the layout of the room, potential scenarios that could happen, and to problem solve in real time. These two days were both the best and worst days of my life. They were awful because they pushed my anxiety to the max. I had to just repeat mock meet and greet scenarios over and over again with my fellow attendants (remember there were only 6 of us). It was the best because this is when I began to realize that one particular attendant was becoming someone important. While waiting in line to take our turns, we were goofing off and making fun of what was happening around us. We were quoting vines (RIP Vine), and making each other laugh. Being around her genuinely made these days so much easier and I don’t think I can ever thank her enough for that. On our breaks we would often break off from the rest of the group and complain about people. We just clicked instantaneously. Our last day of training, we were evaluated and passed. We were now part of an exclusive club of people that were trained to work with this talking mouse that never worked correctly. During our training they actually told us all the ways he could break, and what you had to do in that situation. Fun fact: since they knew that the venue was being discontinued, they hadn’t put any money into it for some time which meant he constantly broke. It made that hell mouth of a location some how even worse.

Let’s get back to the friendship, Katie and I were scheduled to work together a couple days later with some princesses. I knew our friendship would last, when we locked eyes across the break room as a princess told us about how she gave herself chemical pneumonia after spraying lysol into a character head and then wore said head for the duration of her set. We found the same things funny, we were both cynical about our magical jobs, and we both hated the same people. Truly a match made in heaven. There really was never any awkward moments between us. Conversation always flowed, or we were comfortable just being in each others presence. The first time we hung out outside of work, we were able to have fun but also just enjoy each others’ presence. Even if the only time I got to talk to her during the day was on our walk through the tunnels, it made my day so much brighter.

She has been there for me through a lot of ups and downs. A couple months after meeting, I got an opportunity for a job back up north. It was something that I was itching to do, and I really wanted to get back into my field. She supported that decision, even though it sucked. I had finally found my person. I had been struggling for so long at that point, and had started to apply for those jobs up north because of how miserable I was. Except I wasn’t so miserable anymore. Katie was there to make the not so happy days bearable again. It was an incredibly hard decision to make, but ultimately I moved to New York, and she stayed at the magical place. She met a cute boy and they are incredibly happy. I don’t get to talk to her as much as I want, and with the current state of the world I unfortunately can’t travel to see her. However, I do know that she will always be there for me. Sometimes it is a heartfelt phone call or text, sometimes it’s a stupid TikTok, or it might be our reactions to something stupid that happened on Vanderpump Rules. I know that Katie is my person, she will always be there for me, cheering me on. I don’t think I can ever express my gratitude and how much she means to me.