Thoughts On Summer Celebrity Deaths

In the summer of '08, I was flipping through some George Carlin cds at a Virgin store in Times Square.  Later, I found out that he died that day.  While I was there, I had bought a T-shirt with John Lennon in military fatigues with the caption "Revolution" on it.  It brought me back to the night of December 8, 1980, when a 16-year-old version of myself visited a local record store in my home state of Connecticut and purchased John and Yoko's Double Fantasy album.    That night, I heard of Lennon's terrible murder.  The next day, there was no school because of a snow storm and I walked around the snow-covered yard in shock.

Just a few nights before Carlin's death, I had watched an HBO special with Carlin broaching the subject of erotic asphyxiation, where a man cuts off his air-supply at the point of sexual climax in order to enhance his orgasm.  Apparently, many males have died this way during the act of masturbation.  Suffice it to say, Carlin didn't recommend it, calling it "too risky."  Whatever the case, he died shortly thereafter of heart failure despite his caution.

One person who did not make it through the summer of '09 was David Carradine.  According to reports, it is likely that the 73-year-old died by this very method of erotic asphyxiation.  Not a very dignified way to go, in my opinion but, after all,  everyone has got to go somehow.  According to the website Pop Eater, (http://www.popeater.com/2009/09/01/summer-of-death/?icid=main|main|dl2|link2|http%3A%2F%2Fwww.popeater.com%2F2009%2F09%2F01%2Fsummer-of-death%2F), 21 celebrities left us during the summer of 2009, including Micael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett, who died on the same day.  Usually, publications report on obituaries of note at year's end but this time they felt the numbers significant enough to file a report of summer celebrity deaths.  

My visit to Virgin that day has become somehow significant to me.  It loosely brought together three of my childhood heroes, Lennon, Carlin, and Carradine, in one day, all who have now met their demise.  Shortly after the visit, the Virgin Mega Store also bit the dust, a reflection of the dying cd.  Times Square just doesn't seem the same to me anymore.