We can be heroes
So. January.
I was sad to learn about the passing of two fairly brilliant musicians whose creativity I have always admired in David Bowie and Paul Kantner. More of you will have heard of the former than the latter, but those of you who knew me and my entirely complete collection of Airplane/Starship albums on vinyl back in the day can probably guess which of these deaths affected me more profoundly. You... would all be wrong.
I'm still trying to process what's going on in my head here myself. I've never really been a huge Bowie fan-- I mean I knew and enjoyed and respected many of his songs, but I never even owned one of his albums or anything. Kantner's death has made me feel nostalgic as hell; I have been listening to favorite old records, and finding in them an excuse to finally upgrade to CD (hello, 21st century.) But it has not made me want to change my life. So why in the world has Bowie's?
I've had this nagging feeling that there was another celebrity, sometime in my past, whose death dredged up similar feelings in me, and tonight I suddenly remembered who it was: Fred Rogers. Is that random enough for you? Because it's not, I'm realizing, a coincidence. Growing up, these two men were the only adults I had ever encountered who communicated to me-- in ways that could not POSSIBLY have been more different from each other-- that it's okay to be yourself, that there's only one person on this whole planet like you, and that people can like you just exactly as you are. And holy shit, that meant a lot more than I realized.
They're both gone now. And I guess I've grown up somehow, when I wasn't looking. So I'm just going to have to start saying it myself. We can do that, you know. If just for one day.
I was sad to learn about the passing of two fairly brilliant musicians whose creativity I have always admired in David Bowie and Paul Kantner. More of you will have heard of the former than the latter, but those of you who knew me and my entirely complete collection of Airplane/Starship albums on vinyl back in the day can probably guess which of these deaths affected me more profoundly. You... would all be wrong.
I'm still trying to process what's going on in my head here myself. I've never really been a huge Bowie fan-- I mean I knew and enjoyed and respected many of his songs, but I never even owned one of his albums or anything. Kantner's death has made me feel nostalgic as hell; I have been listening to favorite old records, and finding in them an excuse to finally upgrade to CD (hello, 21st century.) But it has not made me want to change my life. So why in the world has Bowie's?
I've had this nagging feeling that there was another celebrity, sometime in my past, whose death dredged up similar feelings in me, and tonight I suddenly remembered who it was: Fred Rogers. Is that random enough for you? Because it's not, I'm realizing, a coincidence. Growing up, these two men were the only adults I had ever encountered who communicated to me-- in ways that could not POSSIBLY have been more different from each other-- that it's okay to be yourself, that there's only one person on this whole planet like you, and that people can like you just exactly as you are. And holy shit, that meant a lot more than I realized.
They're both gone now. And I guess I've grown up somehow, when I wasn't looking. So I'm just going to have to start saying it myself. We can do that, you know. If just for one day.