After a week of grieving and painful reflection, I wanted to share some of my thoughts with you.
When I first heard the news, like many of you, I was in complete shock. I had to read my phone screen several times to make sure I was seeing it right.
My brain just couldn't absorb what it was seeing.
When it finally did, because everyone in my house are passionate basketball fans, I was devastated.
It’s amazing, isn’t it, how the loss of someone you never met can feel like a death in the family? I believe it's because in a sense, they are family.
African Americans, in particular, are connected by a common shared experience that can make us feel like a giant, extended family.
Being oppressed creates a whole new level of bonding.
It's why we've always shared greetings among ourselves like, "what's up brother". Or, "hey sistah, how's it going?"
Ever hear those kinds of greetings in the white community?
As fate would have it, over the past decades, black people have felt the loss of extended family members time and time again.
Many of our heroes, heroines, and larger than life personalities have left us far too soon. Their leaving so tragically, and so suddenly, is a blunt reminder of how vulnerable and fragile we all are.
If it can happen to them...
It can happen to any of us.
And so, for me, Kobe's and Gianna's tragic passing brought back memories of other such losses that the black community has experienced in my lifetime.
Martin Luther King
Malcom X
Otis Redding
Whitney Houston
Michael Jackson
Lisa Lefteye Lopes
Prince
Aaliyah
Len Bias
Teddy Pendergrass
Donnie Hathaway
Tupac
Biggie Smalls
And these are just the ones that came to mind. The list of family members who are now on the "night shift" (as the Commodores so eloquently put it) is long indeed.
Furthermore, when you reflect upon the ages they left us, you realize how much of their potential was unrealized.
You begin to understand what you lost.
What we all lost.
Teddy Pendergrass was only 59.
Prince was only 57.
Michael was only 50.
Whitney was only 48.
Marvin was only 44.
Kobe was only 41.
Malcom was only 39.
Martin was only 38.
Donnie Hathaway was only 33.
Lisa Lefteye was only 30.
Otis Redding was only 26.
Tupac was only 25.
Biggie was only 24.
Len Bias was only 22,
Aaliyah was only 22.
Gianna "Mambacita" Bryant was only 13.
All of these African American goldmines... gone. And, so much of their treasures gone with them.
The suddenness of their passing feels savagely brutal.
But they are also reminders of how temporal our existence really is.
These tragedies serve as reminders that we all are just cosmic fireflies... here for a very short time.
They are reminders of what's really important.
What really matters.
As painful as they are, they can help us live better lives.
Joseph Campbell said years ago that the secret to happiness and contentment is simply to follow your bliss. I believe that's true.
Do what you love... while you can.
But how many of us end up spending our short, firefly lives in a cubicle somewhere?
Sticking our heads up from time to time like a prairie dog sticking his head up out of his burrow?
How many of us fall into being tiny, meaningless cogs in some soul-less corporation? A corporation that doesn't gives a rat's hiney about them.
Too many of us.
So, every once in a while, a tragedy like Kobe's death jolts all of us back to the stark reality of our mortality and the very finite time we all
have.
Death is coming for us all... and we never know when.
So, while we're here, we should live, laugh and love.
We should value friends, family and community.
We should have dreams we're pursuing. Our own dreams.
We should follow our bliss.
We should... make a ruckus.
I've got much love for all of you who are.
Peace,
Brian
