im-mor-tal-i-ty: (noun) immortal condition or quality; unending life; enduring fame.
Luc Bourdon died today. This makes me sad. Not because he's a hockey player or because he would have done great things for the Canucks, but because he was only 21 and that is just far too young. It's just not supposed to happen.
Of course, this is not to take away from the many other deaths we hear about every day, young and not-as-young dying, all over the world. Whether the earthquake in China or the monsoon in Burma or the multiple murder in Calgary or the steady tally coming from the Middle East, they all suck. And they are all sad.
But what struck me most about Luc Bourdon's death is that it felt like he shouldn't have died because he's in the NHL and, well, he's a sports-lebrity and they just don't die. Heath Ledger's death was shocking much for the same reason. Also too young, but more so because he's famous and he's in The Dark Knight and he's just not supposed to die. From John Lennon and Kurt Cobain to River Phoenix and Brad Renfroe to John Ritter and John Belushi to Dale Earnhardt and Lou Gehrig - they just shouldn't have died. Or maybe not that they shouldn't have died; more like they're not supposed to. They're famous. Therefore they are immune to death.
This may seem rather superficial to some, but imagine how shocked you would be to read in the news tomorrow that Brad Pitt was killed in a car accident. Or that Halle Berry died in a plane crash. Or that Julia Roberts accidentally fatally mixed sleeping pills and a hot toddy. How shocked were you when you first heard about Owen Wilson's suicide attempt?
I realize that most of the examples I'm giving are Hollywood celebrities that we all know of and not quite the same league as an up-and-coming Canadian hockey player. But the fact that the headline read "Luc Bourdon killed" and not "Man, 21, killed" indicates that we know him well enough to put his name in the headline. And it still feels like those people just shouldn't die.
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