So George Carlin is dead. I can literally say that I never once in my life considered his death. So I hate to start doing so now after all this time but seeing as he is dead it’s kind of hard to avoid when I’m talking about it.
I really don’t have a lot to say about George Carlin, he was a comedian, I thought he was funny about as often as I thought he wasn’t, I found him intelligent, and in that vein I could always see his point whether I agreed with it or not. As far as american comedians go he really opened the door for a lot of other guys (I’ve never heard a female comedian mention him as a big influence, which doesn’t mean he didn’t influence any of course) and probably closed it for just as many others if you think about it for a minute. Yeah George, right until the end you have us thinking about it for a minute.
I never saw him perform in person and I guess that I do regret that. I actually had considered doing so on various occasions and now that I think about it as recently as two months ago I passed on getting tickets to see him but money was tight and I didn’t have anyone to go with and anticipated trouble getting there and back. Since it wasn’t exactly the perfect opportunity it wasn’t very difficult for me to pass on it because I remember distinctly thinking that there would always be another chance to see him perform. But it turns out there wasn’t.
And that’s life kids. You never really know when it’ll be the last time or the first time when it comes down to it, try as you might to predict things. I remember saying here last year that if you let anything (rather, anyone) go you never know if you’re going to see it (them) again and this just goes to show the meaning of that. But at the same time I don’t think it’s worth doing anything just because you might not get the chance again.
Now personally as far as iconic american celebrities “that have been around forever” go I would say that Johnny Cash was the first one to go that I never thought about, Marlon Brando followed relatively soon after but you’d look at that guy through the 90s and just think “when”. Brando is the first one to come to mind when you consider who the biggest one to go this decade is but that’s trivial. I wouldn’t be surprised if these 7x year old people who never took care of themselves start dropping like flies though. Clint Eastwood is someone I think about dying, Willie Nelson, Elizabeth Taylor (on that note I didn’t realize Liz Claiborne was already dead), B.B. King, Jack Nicholson… Well Taylor fell out of the limelight a long time ago and Eastwood has really curbed his acting duties back (if you saw “blood work” you might thank god for that) but it’s hard to imagine those guys not putting anything out anymore let alone dying.
But it will happen someday, they’ll die, I’ll die, you’ll die. Who knows who will go first (king, eastwood, nicholson, taylor, me, you, nelson) or last (I’d bet money on Nelson) but it doesn’t matter. Just enjoy them and yourselves while you still can, and the older you’d get the more I’d say you should focus on what you want to do rather than what you need to do. Try to leave hard work and misery in your youth and find things that interest and bring you joy by the time you’re silver.
Well anyway here’s to you George, as many drugs as you purportedly did maybe it’s a miracle you made it this far.
The Sky Before Dawn 