Perhaps

I get it. I really do. When you are famous your death makes waves. And if the cause of that death is the current illness du jour, cancer, then the numbers who identify are literally millions. Yet once my shock and sadness at a safe distance are sated, the appropriate Facebook meme posted, I always wonder about the other deaths that occurred that day. More numerous, but mostly unseen; grieved only by close family and friends.

Does the size of the grieving circle say anything at all? It's is hard to believe anyone would say that one life, one death was more important than any other. So can we just celebrate that our reaction to the famous makes us widely compassionate? Or does that reaction obscure those deaths closer to home that go unnoticed?

Perhaps our willingness to look at a famous death makes us more compassionate for the unseen deaths that surround us.

Perhaps our willingness to look at famous death makes us consider our own mortality more closely and honestly.

Perhaps that is enough.