I had planned to comment on other things today, but it seems Heath Ledger is the name on most people’s lips … including mine.I don’t have much to add, except that I’m still flabbergasted.
I found out as I rode the elevator, heading home tonight: CNN: Heath Ledger dead … reports NYPD. I looked away after I finished reading the severed sentence — customary elevator behavior. But I had to look again: was it true? Did I miss February and March and was it April Fool’s?
I’ve never been a huge fan of Heath Ledger, but I’d have been the first to admit that he was one of the few young actors who actually had some acting chops. And he was so young.
I haven’t been this shocked by a celebrity’s death since, well, she’s not exactly a celebrity, but when I was 9 or 10, this 7-year old girl by the name of Jessica and her father made the rounds on early morning TV to promote her first flight as a pilot, which would’ve made her the youngest pilot ever. Two days after seeing her on Good Morning America, she and her father were gone. That was the first time I realized how quickly things could change and how ephemeral life really was.
And strangely enough, this is exactly how I feel about Heath Ledger’s passing. Things seemed to be going so well for him: he was a respected actor, had a darling two-year-old daughter, and was rumored to be back on the dating scene again.
I know I’m being naive, but I’d much rather hear that he’d died of natural causes (he was said to have suffered a bout of pneumonia recently) or been murdered than he’d taken his own life. It would give me the peace of mind that I don’t have the right to claim.
