Looks like another one bites the dust. Dallas McKennon, the voice of various cartoon characters and more importantly, Gumby, has died at the age of eighty-nine. The old man died of; you guessed it, being old. He was almost ninety years old. So it makes some sense that he died of age related issues. But his death is not one that does not come alone. With his death we have completed a pretty impressive couple of months. We have lost a lot of people, yes, but more importantly a lot of celebrities are digging their six-foot grave.
The list includes such names as Steve McNair, Farrah Fawcett, Billy Mays, and Michael Jackson. Sure, a lot of other folks have died that have some celebrity status attached to his or her name, but those are the big ones. Well, all of those and Oscar Meyer. He was pretty stinking old too. But he sure did know how to make wiener.
But with all these deaths, celebrity or not, people are starting to raise questions. People are worried that if you are a celebrity then you need to watch your back because you could be next. I almost smell a movie series here. You know the kind that I am talking about, right? Think Final Destination. And Final Destination 2. And 3. And now, saying not a continuation is THE Final Destination. We get the picture; people are going to die. It is starting to become like the Saw series. There are only so many ways that you can kill a guy.
Anyway, moving on. I have not taken too much time to talk about all of these individual deaths, and I will not here either. But I did want to wrap up my thoughts on this. I will now break down the deaths of each one of these celebrities and why he or she has died. Here we go.
Billy Mays – Billy Mays was what most considered a shock. Better known as the Oxy Clean guy from television infomercials, he was the bearded loud mouth that made his living by screaming at you with enthusiasm and confidence to purchase his products. He was almost annoying in his antics and you cannot walk through a grocery store and not see ten of his products. He was starting to move to exercise equipment and silly putty when he bit the bullet. (Did you ever see him in a shirt that was not blue? I think everywhere that I saw him he had on a blue top.) But Billy Mays will not be gracing our TV sets any longer. Actually, I take that back. I walked in the other day and he was on selling his Oxy Clean. It was in the early evening and even though he is gone, his voice lives on. (He has quite a YouTube presence as well.) But a few weeks ago Billy did not wake up. I will only mention briefly that it was made public on Twitter. His son, who looks a lot like him, posted a tweet on Twitter that said, “My dad did not wake up this morning.” And that is how the world learned about the death of a TV super star.
But see, Billy did not die of old age. He was only in his early fifties (his birthday is actually today if that is not creepy enough for you) but was not the healthiest cat on the block. Billy was not skinny, or fat I guess, but he did suffer from heart problems. Billy actually had, and died, from heart disease. This was something that his family knew about, and something that was destined to happen. (Why do we say that? We are all going to die. It is all of our destinies.) So there is celebrity number one; Billy Mays dies of heart disease.
Farrah Fawcett – Coming from the classic television show Charlie’s Angels, this broad was fighting a long battle. Farrah suffered from cancer and was loosing weight, hair, and hope for the last few years. I do not know a lot about her, her show, or her career, as it was before my time, but I know that a lot of people a few years older than me did in fact like her a lot and made a big fuss of her anticipated and expected death. But to keep with my theme here, Farah dies of cancer.
Dallas McKennon – As the voice of Gumby, and others dies of old age.
Ed McMahon – Old age.
(By the way, I am not getting lazy. I just am trying to prove a point without talking all night.)
Michael Jackson – Michael was about to make his come back. He was rehearsing and getting ready for his fifty sold out dates in London. I actually, a little upset I was unable to get tickets, am now OK that I did not. As for Michael Jackson bi t the dust a few weeks back. As new music starts to come from the wood works, he remains, weeks after his death, a Twitter trend topic to this day. But Michael Jackson died of a drug over dose. But this makes sense, as he was addicted to drugs.
So do you see a trend here? All of these celebrities are dying, sure, but not a single one of them has died in an uncommon or unexpected manner. I mean, every single death, whether it is my mom, your cousin, her uncle, a homeless guy from the south side, or Michael Jackson is a tragedy. It is a damn shame to see someone lose their life and not be able to share another day with his or her family. But I will also be damned if you will sit there and say that because they are celebrities are why they are dying. People die; it’s nature. But just because five or ten people that have a name for they have died does not mean anything.
They all died young. They all died too soon. (Everyone dies too soon.) And they died with a nation watching. But guess what; they are gone and there is nothing more than we can do than remember them. Jewish people remember for seven days. How long did you remember these folks?
