Wolfe Disney World

The old theme park ain't what it used to be, but summer is trying to get going. Even though only a handful of people come in, they all want what they want right now.

You don't make a living in vacation country by telling people to chill out and wait. Especially now that numbers are way down, you need to score all you can -- ethically, of course.

In the peak years, we could come in an hour early and stay an hour late, and still fall behind. The instant gratification crowd had to be patient because of their own numbers. If someone decided not to wait, someone else was right in line behind them. Even then, that intensity would only last a few days at a time, for a few weeks.

These days, work does not back up enough to demand an extra hour or more, but if things come in late in the day, late in the week, closing time may not be quitting time. The few people who still show up don't seem to have noticed that nearly everyone else is gone. They come in with the same urgency the whole crowd had when the town was a party from late June through Labor Day. Things kept perking fairly briskly to the final peak on Columbus Day weekend.

No more.

Today I could have put in a little extra time, but I wanted to sprint out from under the leading edge of a line of thunderstorms the weather service is calling a cold front. Pretty funny cold front: the high today was in the low to mid 80s, and tomorrow, after the front, it's predicted to hit 90. I guess the key here is the humidity. It will be a relatively dry heat, after a couple of days of jungly mugginess.

I wonder what the town would do for an economy if tourism died out completely? Back in colonial times, when Governor John Wentworth had the summer place that established Wolfeboro as "The Oldest Summer Resort in America," the area was known for timber, furs and fish. Now there's much less demand for wood, people don't wear much fur, and you can't eat more than a little of the fish for fear of mercury contamination.

If we have to rely entirely on the super rich and famous, how many lackeys do they need to keep their toy village looking good enough for the few weeks a year any of them are here?

I wonder if there's a good dystopian fantasy story in this. If I can come up with a screenplay, I can cruise Main Street until I run into someone in the biz.