Walt Disney Needs to Chill Out
. . . and he should have.
Frozen like the summertime and chilled like the sun’s surface, both of these are lies. Kind of like Walt Disney. That liar! Actually, he might not be a liar, but the rumor of him being frozen is. I doubt Disney knew much about the process of being “frozen,” let alone doing it. I think it’s a fantasy we all want to be a reality in our heads, like the tooth fairy taking our fallen out teeth, and replacing it with money under our pillow.
So, where is he if he’s not frozen? Sad to say, he was cremated.
“Lots of people think that he was, and that the body’s in cold storage in his basement. The truth is, Walt missed out. He never specified it in writing, and when he died the family didn't go for it. They had him cremated.” (Los Angeles Times)
But, that doesn't mean we can’t imagine the alternative time line where he is. So. . .
What if?
Exactly, what if Disney had been frozen? Well, first he would have needed to be more informed on the subject, as this was the primary reason he never went through with it. I think if he had known more of what was required to have been frozen he would be. It was the conversation and its lack of details that kept him from becoming the first in the record books. The discussion of Walt Disney entering the cryonics lab was made casually — mistake one — and with brevity to his representative. A conversation that should have taken place with him alone.
“I told her we didn't have the necessary infrastructure at that time . . . If things had worked out differently, Walt Disney could have been the first man frozen.” (Freezing People Is (Not) Easy)
But, how?
There is an order to preparing one’s self for an eternity in ice. For Disney to have become preserved he would have had to undergo having the water in his cells replaced with cryoprotectants — chemicals formulated to maintain his biological quality of life — so he wouldn't get freezer burn. Without this, his body could get irreversibly damaged, resulting in a more beast than beauty sort of look. To keep that aesthetic of old, he would have to either be intracellularly or extracellularly protected, meaning he would have to allow chemicals to either permeate his cells or not. Letting the chemicals penetrate means no freezer burn, whereas the non-penetrating chemicals mean his cells would see minimal damage. If the representative had not been present and he had been informed directly, I’m sure he would have waited for the infrastructure and not had himself declared for cremation.
If only.
It’s interesting to know how it could have panned, especially for the fact that “he was a very brilliant individual and he was checking all the bases.” It was a consideration, but sadly the information to him wasn't there. It’s to this that people mistake the interest he had, for the literal. And though it would have been done if everything would have been aligned, in reality it didn't. At least we can still dream.
