Derailed last year because of COVID, 'The Polar Express' is back on CORSE
SCITUATE – The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way families celebrate holiday traditions. Many now wear masks around older family members or get tested before and after large gatherings.
For families taking their children to the North Pole Express Movie Experience at Scituate High School, change meant watching a holiday classic in a theater instead of on a moving train.
Children wearing pajamas lined up with their parents Saturday afternoon as they waited to enter the school's auditorium to watch "The Polar Express."
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The event was staged by the Community of Resources for Special Education, and the experience usually takes place during a train ride on the Greenbush commuter line from Scituate to Weymouth and back.
It has always been Community of Resources for Special Education's big event, Scituate STEM teacher Liz Dorgan said, and it usually sells out months ahead of time.
On Saturday, 7-year-old Ella Martin left her place in line to greet one of the mascots, a polar bear. She gave the beara big high-five, grinning.
"They've read the book ever since they were little," said Ellen Martin, her mother, keeping her family's place in the line. Ella, her twin sister, Nora, and their father, Doug, had briefly left to warm up in their car.
The Marshfield family sported matching blue pajama bottoms dotted with polar bears and Christmas trees.
"We did a train one a couple years ago," Ellen Martin said, "and so we just wanted to try something different. ... (I) thought it might be nice to come and support a local school."
As Martin spoke, a small group of seventh graders performed Christmas music on flutes to entertain shivering families in line. A bubble machine whirred nearby, showering people outside and giving the children a reason to run about and pop bubbles with glee.
"It's a little different this year," Community of Resources for Special Education board member Marcell St. Jean said, "but again, I'm hoping that people can still get into the holiday spirit and enjoy what the holiday season is all about, just in a different format."
St. Jean said the high school jazz band would be performing between the three afternoon showings on Saturday, and carolers would be stopping by to serenade families as they enter the school.
After the movie ended, North Pole characters – including the big man in red himself – greeted families.
Alyson Doyle, a mother from Scituate, said her family did the train experience several years in a row before the pandemic changed plans last year.
"They're still young enough where they enjoy that stuff," she said as her children flitted between her and the polar bear, penguin and gingerbread man roaming the sidewalk. "Now they want to sit for the movie and watch that."
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Doyle was accompanied by her daughter, Kennedy, 7, and sons, Myles, 4, and Parker, 5, as the family waited for the doors to open and to get out of the cold.
Doyle said she liked that Saturday's event limited the number of people and allowed for social distancing between families in the theater while requiring masks.
"Myles, what's your favorite part of the movie?" Doyle asked her youngest son as she picked him up.
"When he goes on the train," Myles said, peeking out from under his inside-out green beanie.
"That part is pretty good," his mom replied, minutes before doors to the school opened and families were welcomed into the warm theater inside.
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Reach Alex Weliever at aweliever@patriotledger.com.
This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: CORSE holds 'Polar Express' experience at Scituate High School
