Monday, November 15, 2010

Early Exploration



Once upon a time children looked forward to Saturday morning cartoons for the entire week. Kind of like training for the real world. There were many odd shows that attempted to capture the attention of the meek, only to penetrate their unsuspecting subconscious minds with commercials, no doubt.

But most of the shows actually carried a social message of some type as well, in the form of a morality tale, parable or homile and I dare say we would be better off watching them than Grand Theft Auto but only time will tell. Rocky and Bullwinkle had a great format, featuring segments within the show like Fractured Fairly Tales or Mr. Peabody and Sherman. Via the Wayback Machine, Sherman would be tutored in Mr. Peabody's tongue-in-cheek improbable history.

In a similar format was King Leonardo and his Short Subjects. One of my favorite segments was Tooter Turtle, featuring Mr. Wizard the Lizard. Tooter would venture into the scene and tell Mr. Wizard of a place or someone he'd rather be and Mr. Wizard would oblige him by casting a spell and putting him there. The adventure always got Tooter into trouble, and he had to call out "Help me Mr Wizard!" at which time the famous incantation would be cast thus: "Drizzle, Drazzle, Druzzle, Drome, time for this one to come home!" And Tooter would be pulled back miraculously through the Cosmic Infidibulum in the nick of time. And upon his return, Mr. Wizard would give Tooter the same advice -


"Be what you is and not what you is not.
Folks that is what they is, is the happiest lot".

Most often one needs to explore to discover what one is. The Cosmic Infidibulum can be daunting and seems uncharted only to the untrained eye. Be fearless.