circle of life

Have you ever achieved something that made you so happy that you wanted to share it with those around you, celebrate, and thank those who contributed to your success in one way or another?

I have. And usually, the people who I want to thank are my parents (though not always).

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In 1938, the same thing happened to a man in LA, California.


In an effort to thank his parents for the success of his first big screen movie, he bought his mother, Flora, and father, Elias a house for their golden wedding anniversary.

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What would you do if your plans of saying thank-you didn't work out as planned? In fact, what if it cost you the life of one of the most important people in your life?
What would you do then?
What if you thought that, if it weren't for you, that person would still be alive? What would you do with that guilt?
And perhaps more importantly, how would that loss and that guilt affect your life (and perhaps, as in the LA case, the lives of millions of other people)?

***

A couple of days after moving in, Flora complained about the smothering heat coming from the central heating boiler. Her son, the man from LA, arranged for a replacement.
Unfortunately, days later, Flora died from asphyxiation caused by the new, poorly insulated boiler...

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"The man from LA" was Walt Disney.

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I'm a huge fan of Disney movies. Even though I'm 20, it is still one of my favorite things to watch a Disney animated movie (I'm especially a huge fan of the original ones-although some of the new ones--like Nemo--are pretty awesome too).

One thing that strikes me as unusual about Mr. Disney's movies, and I didn't realize this until about two years ago, is the way he presents families.

There is always someone missing from the picture. Either the father, the mother, or sometimes even both are killed, not even introduced, abandon their families, or get separated from their children.

Here are a few examples to refresh your memory:

Lion King- Simba's father is killed by his very own brother.

Bambi- his father abandons him and his mom before his birth, and then his mom gets shot by hunters.

Nemo- his mother and siblings are killed in a violent barracuda attack, and spends most of the movie estranged from his father.

Snow White- her mother passes away after giving birth to her, and then her father dies too. She is left with a cruel step-mom.

Dumbo- he is fatherless from the start, and separated from his mother when she is locked up because of her psychosis. 

Little Mermaid- she doesn't have a mother.

Andy (of Toy Story)- he is raised by a single mother.

Tarzan- grows up without his real parents in a jungle.

There are many, many more examples, and I'm sure you won't have a hard time coming up with a few on your own.

So what do these all mean?

Was it the death of his mother that caused Mr. Disney to create these characters or story-lines?

It might be important to keep in mind that the big screen movie that helped Mr. Disney buy the house in the first place was "Sleeping Beauty", Sleeping Beauty being a girl who grows up not knowing who her real parents are.

Perhaps, it was not Flora's passing that inspired Mr. Disney, but an urge to question and present the disintegration of the traditional family to such a widespread audience.

Either way, it is amazing to see how movies, even cartoons and animations, have the power to trigger such thoughts.