Odd
I've found myself strangely sad for the last three days.
I never thought that I was a person to get upset about the death of someone I never knew. But I find myself near tears anytime I hear about Heath Ledger on the TV or radio or anytime I see something on the internet about his death.
I didn't know this man. I would likely, in my lifetime, NEVER have known this man. Why does his death effect me in such a strong and profound way?
Is it because he was my age? I'll be 27 this year, making him only a little older than me.
Is it because I'm rapidly approaching 28, the magical age at which most famous cult-figures seem to part with this world?
Is it because his untimely death brings to light my own mortality?
Is it all of these things?
As I've gone through my twenties, I've watch my peers marry, have children, divorce in some instance, buy houses, and get careers. Perhaps it is the reality that the older I get, the more people close to my age I will see die. When I was a teenager I was absorbed with myself, as all teenagers are. Life outside the teenage years seems unimportant, if I even knew it existed at all. As I've gotten older, life has taken over, as have all the realities life brings: life and death. Perhaps his death hurts me because I realize that, while I am not old, I am not getting any younger, and death will become a more prominent part of life than it was when I was younger. Death will mean more because the older I get, the closer to death I, myself, get. And the death of someone so close in age to me, who was in much the same place in life as I am: starting out a career, learning to be an adult, having a family (in his case) brings to light the fact that we all die. I will watch countless people around me pass away before I will inevidibly pass on myself. Some of these people will go when their lives are full and long; some will pass early, as Heath Ledger did. The latter of these two brings out the unfairness of life; an unfairness I will have to face for a long time.
Perhaps it is none of this.
Perhaps I am sad at the loss of a beautiful man, who is leaving behind a beautiful little girl who will forever wonder what her father was like, and why he had to go so early.
Perhaps I am sad that the swiftness with which death took him, and the unfairness of the circumstances.
Perhaps I have simply learned to feel again...
I never thought that I was a person to get upset about the death of someone I never knew. But I find myself near tears anytime I hear about Heath Ledger on the TV or radio or anytime I see something on the internet about his death.
I didn't know this man. I would likely, in my lifetime, NEVER have known this man. Why does his death effect me in such a strong and profound way?
Is it because he was my age? I'll be 27 this year, making him only a little older than me.
Is it because I'm rapidly approaching 28, the magical age at which most famous cult-figures seem to part with this world?
Is it because his untimely death brings to light my own mortality?
Is it all of these things?
As I've gone through my twenties, I've watch my peers marry, have children, divorce in some instance, buy houses, and get careers. Perhaps it is the reality that the older I get, the more people close to my age I will see die. When I was a teenager I was absorbed with myself, as all teenagers are. Life outside the teenage years seems unimportant, if I even knew it existed at all. As I've gotten older, life has taken over, as have all the realities life brings: life and death. Perhaps his death hurts me because I realize that, while I am not old, I am not getting any younger, and death will become a more prominent part of life than it was when I was younger. Death will mean more because the older I get, the closer to death I, myself, get. And the death of someone so close in age to me, who was in much the same place in life as I am: starting out a career, learning to be an adult, having a family (in his case) brings to light the fact that we all die. I will watch countless people around me pass away before I will inevidibly pass on myself. Some of these people will go when their lives are full and long; some will pass early, as Heath Ledger did. The latter of these two brings out the unfairness of life; an unfairness I will have to face for a long time.
Perhaps it is none of this.
Perhaps I am sad at the loss of a beautiful man, who is leaving behind a beautiful little girl who will forever wonder what her father was like, and why he had to go so early.
Perhaps I am sad that the swiftness with which death took him, and the unfairness of the circumstances.
Perhaps I have simply learned to feel again...