Jason Cole

If there was a message from Michael Irvin’s splendid week, it’s that sometimes children need to a good dose of imagination to create a better reality.

And sometimes adults with child-like tendencies need a dose of reality to make their dreams come true.

On Thursday, Irvin took 40 underprivileged children from the Fort Lauderdale, Fla., neighborhood where he grew up to Disney World. The kids, who were six or seven years old, earned the trip through good attendance and good work in school and at an after-school program Irvin sponsors in the city.

The majority of the kids had never seen the theme park, other than the images on TV, even though they live only three hours from it.

“It’s such a beautiful day,” Irvin said as he walked around the park with the kids. “This is a chance to show kids that if they go out and get an education there’s a big world out there with a lot of big ideas. If we want kids to achieve things, we have to teach them to have big dreams. This is an example of those big dreams, bringing them here.”

Irvin also could see that part of feeding the teams was getting the children there when they were young.

“They see Mickey and Minnie at this age and they think they’re real,” said Irvin, who got the idea for the Disney trip when he brought the two characters to an event in Fort Lauderdale and saw the children swarm the characters. “You see it in their faces when they see Mickey and Minnie, when they’re walking down Main Street and see all the stories. I heard one of them say, ‘Why can’t we move here.’

“You want to teach kids that anything is possible and this is a way of doing that … The first time I came here was when I was a senior in high school for grad night. By that time, I already knew there was somebody up under that costume.”

Irvin made it through the jaded stage to have a career that borders on being Hall of Fame stuff as a wide receiver, helping Dallas to three Super Bowl titles as the team’s leading target.

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In the same vein, you have to wonder if new Cowboys star receiver Terrell Owens will overcome his petulant behavior of the past to achieve the big dreams he has for himself and which he creates in the minds of other teammates and fans with his ability.

Irvin, who is perhaps Owens’ top confidant at this time, thinks that will happen now that Owens is playing for coach Bill Parcells, a man who pretty much tells it publicly like he thinks it privately. Many people have said that Owens and Parcells are a bad match because of that.

Irvin thinks it’s completely the opposite.

“Bill Parcells doesn’t pull any punches. The guy says exactly the same thing to you in private that he says to the public,” Irvin said. “I think that exactly the kind of coach Terrell needs because that’s the kind of person Terrell is. He doesn’t pull any punches.

“Terrell is excited about this situation and that’s really important. He really wants this to work and he knows that Parcells wants this to work.”

If Owens and Parcells are on the same page long enough, that could be enough to change everything for Dallas. In Owens, Dallas has a game-changing weapon who quarterback Drew Bledsoe will be happen to dump the ball to on slants and quick posts, distributing the ball before the pass rush can undermine him and the rest of the offense.

Owens, unlike Keyshawn Johnson, can turn those shorter throws into big plays. With Terry Glenn as a complement on the other side and two good tight ends, the Cowboys are well-positioned to take the offense to a championship level.

Still, the relationship between Owens and Parcells will be central.

“I think it’s going to be a strength for them,” Irvin said of the receiver and the coach. “I watched how Parcells talked about Terrell at that first press conference and he handled every question. There were like 35 straight questions about Terrell and Parcells answered every one of them. You’d think after that long he’d get tired of it, but he was straightforward about it. I think that’s a good sign.”