Memories Going Up In Smoke

Sunday morning's newscasts here in Southern California were dominated with the big fire that hit the backlot of Universal Studios. Up in smoke went the town square made famous in Back to the Future. Lost was the facades of New York Street that were used in many films including the classic, Inherit The Wind. Additionally, a film vault was lost which housed copies of numerous movies.

As the flames engulfed this world of pretense, one's emotions were taken down memory land. Here in la-la land, most of us have visited Universal numerous times. All though many of the main attractions periodically change, the basic studio tour has not. You get on a tram with an amateur college aged comedian and tour the sets of films and TV shows that may or may not strike your fancy depending on how old you are or what type of programming fit your fancy.

There in front of you is the home that the Cleavers "lived" in on Leave It To Beaver. Over there is the infamous Bates Hotel where we all have gotten the message to lock the door before taking a shower. There is the pond where Jaws hangs out. And on it goes. A fake world that has taken on real meaning to many of us.

Comparing my own reaction to the fire, I find some shame. Just recently we have seen (perhaps not as much as we should have seen - see my 5/15 blog entry) real calamity in China, Burma, Iraq, Tibet, and Darfur. For a moment our being stops and we wonder how such horrible things can happen and what will the survivors in these varied places do with their lives. But the moment does not last and we move on. And yet here was a "disaster" where no one died and some set pieces vanished. (Indeed, Universal is already open for business and statements have been made that most of the facades will be rebuilt.) Yet the hold that this world of celluloid has upon us is truly amazing. I found myself taking much longer to linger over this event than many of the real events mentioned above.

It is too easy to say that I will teach myself to steer clear of crying over fiction instead of truly caring about what is real. I would love to think that if these were the last copies of precious classical novels that I would pause long and hard and feel sadness. But here I am with my own thoughts, in distress over some brick, wood, and fiberglass building fronts that were featured in movies that marked my way in life. The reality is that what we touch with our own hands, see with our own eyes, and experience with our own life is so powerful that it overpowers what should be an intellectual way of dividing what is and what is not important in this world of ours.