From six to sixty. Not just a plaque and a post office. Not just a marker and a mini-mart. The variety of artificial life excites and awakens those desires that 50 weeks of work have so well narcotized. Thousands of people walk ahead of and behind us from the Dinosaur Park to the Bible Land to the Mother Goose Forest .
Time stands still.
All is as it should be. A mecca's pilotfish, the Ripley's Believe It Or Not s, Guinness World Record Museums , and Wax Worlds , gently scrape the last scraps of green from between our billfold. All meccas do share certain bony protuberances, Olde Tyme Photo Booths and go-karts, funnel cakes and fudge, arcades and Goofy Golfs. But each mecca is different, as individual as children's fingerprints on your sunglasses. A typical summer afternoon in Gatlinburg, TN , finds traffic at a standstill.