A Real Downer

I can't believe that I have not addressed a particular grievance connected to death and celebrities. I've gone into my problems with poorly-composed obituaries, and I've brought up my issues with celebrity birthdays (post-mortem ones included), but somehow I may have neglected to write anything about a real bother: I just can't stand the fixation people have on celebrity deaths any longer. It was something that I was as much into as anyone when younger, but at my present level of maturity I can't bear it.

Death is a horrible but inevitable, immutable part of life. Everyone around us passes, and then we go ourselves. Each loss is a hard, brutal, traumatic experience, and we do our best to be of comfort to one another while trying to pick up the pieces and make sense of it all for ourselves. For my own part, this is something that I scarcely have it in myself to do for those who I care about the most, but them I always have been odd.

I must be odd, because most people love this stuff. They positively cannot get enough of it. I know this is so, because not only do they have it in themselves to grieve so thoroughly for friends and loved ones, they have enough left over to grieve for whatever A-list, B-list or C-list (and lower) stars have gone and died on a given day as well. I don't get it at all, but they have a well of compassion and sensitivity I cannot fathom.

What's incredible is how suddenly it appears. Somebody who hasn't been in the public consciousness for decades suddenly strikes a chord on their dying day, and people who you never would have guessed had heard of them are very nearly putting on a veil of mourning. I guess it would be cynical to accuse them of faking it, but I do have a cynical streak in me. That's not the crux of my vexation, though. I just don't know why some people are so eager to wallow in grief. I'm grateful myself for any days where I can avoid it, and they are all too few for this short existence we have.