This is one of just many musical tributes to the loss of a great artist and since it’s Bruce, it’s especially meaningful to me.
When a celebrity dies, the public memories of respected peers add a kind of emotional gravitas that helps all of us who love the mourner or the mourned – or both.
Personal loss. though, has a weight and impact hotter, sharper and deeper.
Sunday, we went to a “shiva,”a home memorial services held for a friend. We’d met him and his wonderful wife on a cruise, sailed all through the Mediterranean and had a great time; we were so happy they lived nearby, especially since we shared so much: they’d been married as long as we have, also had grown kids and grandkids and, it turned out, lived just across San Francisco Bay from us.
Larry was a blast to be around, intense, funny, smart and curious; he and his wife Gerri were a great pair and it was so very hard to see her grieving so intensely.
As I near my 8th decade with very little sense of age, I’m so aware of each loss of a peer and remember my dad telling me with astonishment every time one of his friends left us; it seemed to impossible to him. Like so many other things, I understand this so much more now.
Of course it’s easier to grieve the loss of a public person, no matter how admired: the sharp reality of a more personal one, deep feeling for his family and realigning of each memory of them, especially in the years that we become so much more aware of our own mortality, cuts and lingers so much more.