I cannot accurately estimate the number of hours I spent listening to George Carlin albums. from 1975 through the end of the decade, Occupation: Foole and On The Road burned up my cassette players and turntable, while they alternately inspired me, and convulsed me with laughter so hard, I'd literally turn purple. He wasn't just funny--he was riotous.
My old friend from high school, Craig Gross, and I must have known every word of those two Carlin records, and would weave them into our own humorous conversations.
"How's your Dog?!! How's your Goddamn dog??!!" That line opens a bit about pets from On the Road that even made my mother laugh. A simple question related in such a way that caught you off guard. Isn't that something you want to ask someone who's a little too attached to their canine? "How's your Goddamn Dog??"
If you read the previous entry here, you'll see that some great people have left the planet over the last couple of weeks. I've tried to express my "stranger's sense of loss." I didn't know George Carlin, but I was influenced by his wisdom and his comedy, and wouldn't have made it through the 70's without him and his like (in earlier posts, I've outlined my favorite comics--"Things that make you go "HA," is the title of the entry).
The truth is, it's starting to upset me that I find myself writing memorials to great people. I hope this pauses for a while, but that's a lot to ask from life. It's essential, I think, to add my take, lest people like George Carlin and Jim McKay be remembered mainly for one incident in the broad spectrum of their careers. Jim McKay was memorialized not nearly as much for his yeoman work as a sportscaster as he was for that hideous day in Munich, September 5, 1972, when he had to describe a terrorist hostage tragedy instead of track and field. It was a highlight, but there was so much more to his work...so much more that I'll remember.
The same for George Carlin. All the post mortems have touched upon his "seven words you can't say" on TV: Shit, piss, fuck, cunt, cocksucker, mother-fucker and tits. "Those are the words that'll curve your spine, grow hair on your hands and bring us, God help us, peace without honor," he added with mock seriousness. Then he went to pains to point out that mother-fucker "...was a compound word." An English lesson, as well as a primer on contemporary mores!
Yet he was so much more than that. The world is short of people who are truly gifted in the way George Carlin was. For every arena that Dice Clay filled in 1988, and Dane Cook filled in 2004, there would be venues three times that size filled with people wondering aloud what those two were all about. That would never be so with Mr. Carlin.
Forget the seven dirty words. George Carlin, besides being so hilarious, had a clear vision, and suffered no...Fooles.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment