Robin Williams

I have lived long enough to see several tragedies announced live on air to a studio audience.  I was awake at just after 1am when it was announced that Princess Diana had died in a car wreck.  I saw it announced when Pope John Paul II passed away.  Recently Nelson Mandella had also died.  In all of those events, the audience stayed somber and quiet.  When it was announced that Robin Williams had passed away, I heard the audience gasp, and slowly start to cry.

I was hoping to have a life time of Robin Williams.  I know now that I was greedy.  I was hoping to have him at least another 30 years, of which I never expected to last.  But now me, and the world, has to figure out how to laugh and have fun without him.  Every couple of years he would pop up and say "remember what it was like to laugh at funny stuff?" and we would.  Every couple of years he would pop up and say "you can't have laughter without knowing what it means to be sad" and we'd cry.  Who else could do that?  That Pantheon is small, and now all who dare to tread that path now tread in the shoes of trying to be Robin Williams.

I resent his inclusion in the "celebrity" news.  The world celebrity is nasty and filthy, and shouldn't apply to Robin.  Robin Williams' death is sad and millions are mourning, not because he was some celebrity, but because he was loved.