Another young star is dead. Michael Jackson will be mourned by millions exactly as were his predecessors, also cut down suddenly in the prime of their celebrity....!
Just as stars in the cosmos burst and flame before finally disappearing, so do celebrities. Only with them it's not a matter of tens of millions of years. Usually only about 30 or 40. There was Rudolf Valentino in the 20's...James Dean in the 50's....Marilyn Monroe in the 60's.....Elvis Presley in the 70's....John Lennon in the 80's...and now Jackson. Each one young and famous and loved. So loved that millions feel this affection for their icon has suddenly been ripped away from them personally, leaving a hole they find hard to fill.
And so there will be the usual rituals. Funeral, editorials, vigils, retrospectives, even love letters sent to the deceased. The lesson -- and there is always a lesson in death -- will be not about Michael. Rather, it will be about us. Our reactions. Our regrets. Our guilts. Our attempts to assure ourselves we didn't really mean all that snickering when he was alive.
With each death -- celebrity or otherwise -- I hear my grandfather's wisdom: "Don't wait for the wake!"
But, you see, we do and we will....! Perhaps it is all so much a part of our frightened human nature that only the fingers of death can pry open the tongue of our feelings. If there was a curse from our paradise lost, this blindness has to be one of the most shallow and callow.
If one were to extend this logic to its grim conclusion, then each of us could make our own list of other lives-to-be-appreciated only at their wake. Lets, see -- there are all those pols we hate, all those neighbors we dislike, all those siblings and relative sand friends we don't understand. And yet....
...we have them with us for only so little a time. Once they're gone, we will have all the time in the world to regret it.
So rest in peace Rudolf, James, Marilyn, Elvis, John, Michael and that entire galaxy of those we have lost sooner then we expected. In the meantime, a bright new hello to all those we have not yet lost. Upon due consideration, you are well worth appreciating more. As we would hope you will appreciate us more.
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"Perhaps it is all so much a part of our frightened human nature that only the fingers of death can pry open the tongue of our feelings."
ReplyDeleteWhat a haunting (and very true) statement.
This is not only a touching tribute to celebrities, but to anyone who has lost someone close to them. It leaves you with a lot on which to reflect...for the ones who have passed as well as the living.
Quite a "haunting" statement!
ReplyDeleteAppreciate now!
I hear two voices echoing my own feelings here...which makes me feel good, for I think the three of us are resonating to the right key...now if only more of us did so more often...there is no time like the present to tell someone you love them....and if we're not careful,there may be NO TIME LEFT AT ALL!
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