People who know me in person know me as a funny guy. I don't know how much of that translates on this blog or any other digital media you may 'know' me from (Twitter, Facebook, Craigslist's 'men seeking...') but I hope it does to some extent.
Regardless, I am the guy who perfected comedic timing in elementary school in order to guarantee one milk-from-nose incident per lunch hour every day. I wore rainbow suspenders to the sixth grade. I made sure my little sister knew who Buster Keaton was before she even went to school. Once at dinner I said 'I can make anything funny' and when challenged to make the food on the plate funny I immediately channeled Chaplin and danced the breadrolls at the end of a pair of forks. And it was funny.
I literally cried myself to sleep when I heard the news that Peter Sellers had died. I was seven.
I am older now. And jaded. I did not react to Robin William's passing with the same innocence lost abandon as I did when I was just a boy. But I have shed tears. And I will continue to do so for some time.
I am older now. I know life is fleeting. Death visits the great and the shit. I know. I get it. Peter Sellers had a heart attack. Mitch Hedberg died of an overdose. Johnathan Winters of old age. It's sad, but it happens.
But Robin. Mr. Williams. He hurt. He was sad. And that is so terrible. Words cannot describe how painful that is, to have taken so much joy from one person only to find they hurt so badly that they felt worthless.
He had kids, he was a father. I'm a father. I cannot imagine the pain one must feel to think that their own children aren't enough of a tether to life to keep them from severing said tether.
But...
Sometimes when you are funny. It's a shield. It's a suit of armor. It keeps people out. It keeps them at arm's length. It gives you total control of any situation. It is the perfect camoflauge.
I started this post with the line 'I loved Robin Williams' but I removed the past tense. Because my love for Robin Williams did not end when he did.
Through his comedy he is immortal but goddamn it he left us way too soon.
It was shocking for us too.
ReplyDeleteThey say comedians can be some of the most sad or angry people around and it can be hard to turn the funny off and be just a normal person so even with the fame, success and wealth you can have from being funny it doesn't mean you can be happy outside that spotlight. I will miss Robin Williams truly he was a gifted person and now we have one less laugh we can have with his passing.
ReplyDeleteNicely written....thank you.
ReplyDeleteDitto
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