Currently... In... Submission

If there is anyone that I feel for out of all the applicants in the Facebook group, it's the poor kids that end up "in submission." It is a weird state that no one has any explanation for, not even Disney. My first application season in Fall 2013 for Spring 2014 was the first known occurrence of people ending up sitting "in submission" for the entire application season with a lot of them just getting "NLIC'd" before they even gotten a chance to take the WBI. The thing that sucks is that it seems like that there is no rhyme or reason for it. No one knows how you end up "in submission" or how you get out. Some people do end up getting their WBIs and others do not. 

I never really was "in submission." On both my first time applying and this time applying, I got my WBI within a couple of hours of submitting my application. Both times I applied on the first day, although I did apply later in the afternoon both times. This time, my sister and I applied at the same time, together, and both of us got our WBIs at the same time too. There is no reason. And it's frustrating, because a lot of people don't even get a fair shot.

That's the irritating thing about it is how "unfair" it feels. How do they determine based off of a basic application that you're not worthy of an interview? And I know that a lot of "real" jobs do the same thing. There are a lot of applications and resumes in the real world that never warrant an interview, but I feel like that's different because they look for experiences that would make you qualified for the job and if you don't have that experience, you don't get an interview because you probably can't do the job. But for the college program? There are plenty of people who do get WBIs and phone interviews AND ACCEPTED that have never had a single job their entire life. I lived with THREE GIRLS on my first program that never had jobs before coming to Disney. So how did Disney decide that they should move on to the WBI? 

The only thing I can think of is it comes down to what roles you put interest in. If you put extremely limited interests in only a few roles, maybe you are more likely to flip into "submission"? But maybe that's not true too. I don't know. No one knows. It even sounds like Disney Recruiting doesn't know. People say that they call casting and casting just kind of shrugs and says it's the computer system. How fucked is that? Ugh.

So listen to me, the potentially one person who may ever read this in coming years, if you are currently in submission, I FEEL FOR YOU AND I HOPE THAT YOU GET YOUR CHANCE TO SHINE.

Pixie Dusted So-and-Sos

A lot of people are privy to the inside joke of telling a guest to "have a magical day." It is, almost exclusively, meant as a way to say "fuck off" to guests who are rude or idiots. Sure, there are some people who legitimately mean it when they say it, but for the most part, no. You do not tell a guest to "have a magical day" unless your true meanings are absolutely sinister. I remember Nicole on one of her first days told a guest to have a magical day and one of the full timers looked at her horrified and said "Those people were so nice! Why would you say that to them?" Because she didn't know.

Well, there is another derogatory term for cast members that sounds really sweet but it's actually a horrible thing to say about someone. It's to say they are "too pixie dusted." I am not sure if this is universal across property, but at Inno we said it all the time. "Oh, that new CP is so 'pixie dusted.' I can't wait to see them crash and burn" or "Maybe it's because I'm still pixie dusted but I think this is a great move by the company." Everyone said it about everyone. It wasn't just something that was said about CPs, although they were mostly the one's that still had pixie dust in their eyes. But there were people of ever status that would be called that. And the weirdest thing is when people would call themselves "pixie dusted" in a defeated tone.

I remember a full timer who was training me on Where's The Fire? towards the end of my program talking shit about my fellow trainee. He was bitter and tired and ready for his program to be over since it literally ended in a week, and she looked at me sadly and said "Maybe I'm just too pixie dusted, but I think this is a great venue to connect with guests." She seemed so sad that she was still "pixie dusted" and that is really fucked. Someone should be happy to be pixie dusted! But that's not how it worked where I was. Still being enamored with the Disney "magic" was seen as a fault. Only the most foolish would be passionate about making memories for families. If you weren't jaded and cynical, you weren't cool. (Come to think of it, this might actually be pretty exclusive to Innoventions. It was a really fucked place where people went to have their spirits die.)

And the saddest thing is, and this is probably not shocking to anyone, is that I would accuse people of being "pixie dusted" all the time too. People who genuinely smiled were the enemy. Hell, I just went to Disney a couple of weeks ago for my birthday and we went back to Inno to visit our friends and I made a derogatory remark about someone being pixie dusted then! Here's the story. I was talking to two full timers about how great it was staying at the resorts and being 100% a guest, with no affiliation to the company at all, and I made the comment to the two full timers "You don't have to think for yourself at all in the resorts. Now I know why guests can be so stupid!" And one of the full timers bitched me out for saying that. First off, I do not work for the company at all anymore. So I can say what I want about whoever I want without facing any disciplinary action. Secondly, guests can be stupid! Guests are stupid everywhere! At Target (where we also call them guests), those assholes can be stupid! And it's not every guest, but it's a lot of them. But I walked away, annoyed, grumbling to Nicole about how this Full Timer was so "pixie dusted" and she needed to get over herself. And it didn't stop there. I kept grumbling. "She has been stuck in this entry level position for years and she still has pixie dust in her eyes. Grow up!" I was really annoyed. And it's not fair. If she is still that passionate about working for Disney, that is a gift. We should not speak ill of those people.

But obviously everyone is a little pixie dusted. That is the only explanation as to why all these college educated adults work for pennies to create magic for these families when they can hardly afford to put gas in their cars. No matter how rude we all are to each other about being passionate about the Disney Ideal, there is a reason why we all stick around. There is a reason why we all want to go back. We truly believe it. We are all Pixie Dusted.