Originally Posted by
Kilgore Trout
Here, is my response to Robin Williams’s suicide. I have changed my tune a bit, as time has passed.....
August 4, 2014 (Facebook)
“I've been silent, which if you know me well enough, is not like me. There is no abysmal, elaborate or dramatic explanation. The only profound thing that I realized, is pensive observation is severely underrated. Today, I feel compelled to share something.
I have no personal tie to Robin Williams or feelings about his suicide. I'm a little bummed that Mork died. Mork from Ork. Sean Maguire seemed to have much stronger emotional fiber.
Regardless, it always seems that the most talented people come across as untouchable and almost godly at their craft. They also emanate an air of perfection, as if nothing could possibly be wrong in their lives. That however, is not a quality that shows up one day as a gift for becoming famous. In fact, to the contrary, it's the result of becoming so unattainable or unrelatable (by those around you) that you are suddenly alone. Often mistaken for egocentricism, it is the exact opposite, it's the removal of identity & removal of "self." It literally thrusts human beings into autopilot and overnight they are forced to learn to maneuver through life with little or no emotion, no attachment to any one thing. Often met with fierce paranoia, lack of trust or a complete inability to cultivate intimacy. The saddest part, is that no matter how one appears publicly, he may very well be internally starving for something which has become completely out of reach.
Take a look at your own life. Think about it from two perspectives, your life exposed to and with media/social media and "your real life." It is easy and pedestrian and common for all of us to create the image of who we want to be when we hide behind devices. We can be whoever we want to be and are able to define exactly what we want others to perceive us to be. It works on a very temporary basis. To add another layer, consider the vast majority of people you interact with daily, electronically. It would be a fair consideration that most of these people act in the same manner many of us have become accustomed to behaving like, with the overwhelming availability or access to the 24/7 inside invitation to the voyeurism we allow to our lives.
Now, consider what it's like to completely unplug. Whether it means that you spend a weekend without your iPhone or the power is out for several days. You spend time with your family. You read an actual book, with pages. You write - with pen, pencil, paper. You remember all of the things that you forgot that you liked.
For just a little while, you are less guarded, more humble. It is the little things, the things. The things that make you who you are, me who I am & us who we are - that is the very thought which starts to cause a visceral rebirth.
I have a hard time believing that is completely unreachable for most people to understand or relate to. If we can't relate to anything else, this is a fundamental truth we should all be able to relate to. Unfortunately, while we are the majority in population we are the minority in persuasion. For that reason, I feel compelled today, and now, to say something.
Here is the relevancy, or what should just to be gleaned from my long-windedness....I feel certain responsibility. Albeit, I should throw in a disclaimer. I'll preempt the rest by saying: I understand that an aloofness followed by suddenly sharing a very strong opinion may seem narcissistic or grandiose. It's not designed to be. I just happened to have experienced - like many others, several immeasurable losses in my adult life. Not every instance could have been avoided or averted. I'm not so bold as to think that I could have exacted any different outcome in any of the cases. What I forever live with, is the fact, or the possibility that if had I said or done something different, if one possible time I rose to the occasion, the outcome may have been different. Rarely does a day go by that I don't think about the one thing I wanted to do or say that I never got around to doing or saying. I wonder if my own peristalsis occurred because I was writing some extemporaneous diatribe re: my political views or discussing my disdain for white cars or my competitive need to rattle off my photographic memory which holds nothing but, passing yard records and every song lyric written. I occasionally wonder how much of my life I have wasted proving a point, being heard or even worse - trying to be right. I could have used that time doing other things instead of wondering if I said a last goodbye to someone who may be gone in the next nanosecond. Instead of continually wondering what I could have done, I think it makes more sense to do what I know I should do and to some degree, have been doing, by isolating myself from things like this exact strand of words.
We hold celebrities, athletes, big personalities to a certain standard of social responsibility, which if you read the beginning of this, is typically something they lack. Ultimately, we are left to explain the inexplicable actions of others (especially those publicly who are unattainable) to our children and others that we surround ourselves with. The most insensible part of this, is that none of us truly have an explanation for things which are inexplicable. If, not when, it comes time to discuss matters such as Robin William's suicide to my daughters, you can bet that I'm going to approach it head-on. Free of media, without opinion and full of facts.
In the end, I guess I feel certain resentment for difficult situations or conversations I (all of us) are forced to have from time to time because of the lack of courage, the lack of honesty, the lack of self endured by others.
I feel a similar responsibility and I need to rise to the occasion, having wasted so many "what if" moments, watching time wash away or allowing so many things fall right out of from my own grasp.
I am going to continue to remain pensive and quiet. My silence should not be mistaken for not having anything to say. My silence is to serve as my voice. My silence is to be spent regaining all those moments that I question...the moments I wonder whether not were lost. I can't change the past, I can't influence anyone else's decisions. At best, I can hope that my actions speak louder than many of the words - many of us hear, from innumerable sources, while we choose to tune out our "real lives."
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