david nelson, who played himself on the sitcom, "ozzie and harriet," has died. which means, part of me has died and moreover, part of an entire generation - the "baby boomers" has died, too.
wow.
it's not a small thing.
back in the 50s and 60s, when "ozzie and harriet" was on t.v., none of us - i mean, none of us - ever thought anyone would die, much less our favorite big brother, dave nelson.
if dave nelson can die, all bets are off.
the only thing that might be worse than dave nelson dying would be for his kid brother, rick ("ricky") to die, which, speaking of that, he did.
ricky nelson died in a plane crash many years ago, and, as awful as that was, it's not the same thing as someone dying a "natural" death.
everyone knows - even innocent, wide-eyed baby boomers who think they have the world on a string - everyone knows that terrible things like explosions and fires and airplane crashes happen. it's odd, in a way......we expect awful things like that to happen every now and then, but we don't expect one of our own to die of "natural causes."
especially not of something like cancer.
but that's what dave nelson did - he died of cancer. colon cancer, to be exact, and while i don't know the details of his medical history, colon cancer is usually one of those cancers that is very successfully treated - provided it is caught early enough.
"provided it is caught early enough." what baby boomer in his or her right mind thinks a.)he's gonna get cancer - any cancer - in the first place and b.)if he does, that he doesn't have all the time in the world to get around to taking care of it?
we baby boomers think we're gonna live forever.
at least, that's what we thought in the 50s and the 60s while we were sprawled on our tummies in the living room, watching "ozzie and harriet."
but, if dave nelson can die, anything can happen.
and if dave nelson can die of highly-curable colon cancer, then, well.......we all better wake up and smell the folgers coffee that mrs. olson told us about during the ads.
