Lampwick

Yesterday I was fast forwarding through a tape of all the stupid things I've ever done.  The tape can play at anytime but most often does when I am driving.  The tape is the creation of my own brain which has spliced together a massive compendium of regretful moments that can run for hours if I let it.  It is loaded with seventy years of my mistakes, embarrassing moments, deceitful behavior and incredible stupidity.  The format is a montage of scenes presented in full color that come at me in rapid fire succession and never fail to produce a visceral reaction on my part.  If Ingrid is with me in the car she will see me clench my fist, wince, flinch or groan for no apparent reason.  She used to ask what was happening but has long since become accustomed to my tape-viewing behavior.

Certainly I attended the tape's premier but I do not remember how old I was when it ran for the first time.  I do recall taking notice that the tape included purely innocent faux pas brought on by my unworldliness as well as evil deeds that were premeditated and intentional.  TV Guide would have listed the tape as a comedy-drama.  I found it puzzling that my brain interspersed acts committed through ignorance among others that were outright despicable.  I assume this is due to never having been caught red-handed at any of my more depraved and malicious acts.  The absence of consequences can blur the line that separates being merely inept from blatantly corrupt.  I also think it is just as hard to forgive yourself for being dumb as it is for being bad.

The mechanism that stores and plays the tape for me is similar to TiVo.  I can start, stop or rewind the tape at anytime and for any scene.  The only function missing is "delete".  Unfortunate moments continue to be recorded and added to the tape but none are ever deleted.  I have learned that it is best not to spend a lot of time viewing the tape. As little as a few seconds of watching yourself wet the bed, drop a fly ball, lie to a friend or roll your car can make you feel like a real shithead.  The majority of the time I will cut the tape off after a few scenes since I suspect it is not healthy to dwell at length on one's foibles. 

Because of my aversion to viewing the tape, decades can go by until a scene will resurface.  Yesterday was the first time in many years that I was once again treated to a glimpse of my fire hazard scam.

In the 1950s the Los Angeles Unified School District and the Los Angeles Fire Department put together a program to make elementary kids aware of fire prevention.  Firemen were dispatched to all of the elementary schools where they spoke to kids about fire hazards in the home.  Kids were given a week to find and eliminate as many fire hazards as they could and record their results on forms that were provided.  The kid that found the most hazards would join the winners from all of the other schools at Griffith Park for a special all-day picnic put on by the LAFD. 

I definitely did not start out intending to misrepresent the hazards that I found and fixed.  At the start of the week I think I did in fact find a legitimate frayed toaster wire and a split extension cord.  In completing the forms for these hazards I was overtaken by enthusiasm.  I never gave the picnic a thought – I got on a roll filling out the forms.  I was excited to learn that writing down that I found something and fixed it was so much easier than actually doing it. 

I was aware that my approach was probably more forward-looking than other kids.  My rationalization went something like this:  There weren't any newspapers stacked next to the space heater, but had there been, my written account of the situation was spot on.  I left out the fact that we did not actually own a space heater as this was hardly relevant given that my approach was wholly theoretical.  By the time the week was over I had written up more than fifty hazards that I had theoretically discovered and resolved at my house and my Cousin Donnie's house.  Had even a fraction of the hazards been real, both structures would have burned to the ground long ago.  A few weeks after I turned in my forms, they announced at a school assembly that I had won the fire hazard contest and would be going to the picnic. 

I went to the picnic on a Saturday with kids from at least a hundred other schools.  We were to ride around on fire equipment, eat hot dogs and compete in games.  I was not comfortable around so many strangers and soon began to regret the whole affair.  A boy asked me to join up with him to run in the three-legged race.  He was very self-assured, could talk a blue streak and pretty much led me around by the nose for the remainder of the day.  We never discussed the fire hazard contest but I wondered if he had earned his way to the picnic the same way I had.  The whole experience reminded me of the scene in Disney's 1940 animated film Pinocchio where the wooden puppet goes to Pleasure Island and meets Lampwick. 

In the film the Blue Fairy brings Pinocchio to life in Geppetto's workshop and tells him he can become a real boy if he proves himself to be brave, truthful and unselfish.  Pinocchio is repeatedly led astray by Honest John the fox and Gideon the cat and is eventually talked in to going to Pleasure Island where there are no rules.  When Pinocchio arrives on Pleasure Island he is befriended by a mischievous boy named Lampwick.   

Dickie Jones was the voice of Pinocchio in the Disney film and Frankie Darro was the voice of Lampwick.  I found it interesting that Darro was born on my birthday.  Darro was raised by a circus family called the Flying Johnsons and became a featured wire walker.  Darro later moved on to Hollywood and appeared in many films and TV shows from the1930s to the 1960s.  He began as a stuntman and graduated to minor roles and did some voice over work to help pay the rent.  His most notable role was as Robby the Robot in the MGM 1956 cult classic Forbidden Planet.  He had no lines and was encased inside the machine from where he maneuvered the seven-foot tall contraption.  With fewer and fewer roles being offered over the years due to his problem with alcohol he opened a bar on Santa Monica Blvd.  He named the bar Try Later which he said was the standard reply he got from the casting offices when he went looking for work.  He passed away in 1976 a year after his last picture Fugitive Lovers where he delivered a convincing performance as the town drunk.