Gene Wilder’s death wasn’t quite the sort of celebrity death that transcends the present tense and becomes a “Where Were You When” moment, but it was the sort that forces the air out of your lungs, oxygenating those cobwebbed thoughts about art and mortality that you had shoved down years ago. Wilder was a luminary in every sense of the word, and his career took educated opinions about self-expression and success to task.
It was the kind of sudden passing that makes thoughts like this linger into a sleepless night:
More I grow old and see sadness meet art, more I can't stand that I spent today watching a DBacks game and thinking about the 02 Celts.