Malcolm, Michael, and Terry

It's been very hard to be a member of what we call Generation X this week. The pain is too big to handle alone.

My title might be a little confusing, so I will get that out of the way first: Malcolm-Jamal Warner, John Michael "Ozzy" Osbourne, and Terry Gene Bollea ("Hulk Hogan") have all passed away, and my mind is in many different places as I type this out. The summer has been hot, financially unrewarding, full of news of insanity, violence and disappointment. It all seems so familiar. And to read about these losses and to have to go on with my day just seems ridiculous.

I do not want to write another set of mini-biographies about the lives of these men. I do not even want to go into the overlaps with the events and culture of the eighties and nineties when I was most into their work and talents. You can read plenty about any of these men and come up with your own portrait of their times and think about your own feelings about them. And I have my own personal feelings about these men.

I begin with...

Malcolm-Jamal Warner was Theo Huxtable on that staple of television many an age ago, "The Cosby Show". It was a much more innocent time, in many ways, and my family - oh, let me be honest here, the whole community - made a point of watching the show together whenever we could. Interestingly, my own father was a fan of the lead, but died a year before the show premiered. I always wondered what he would have made of the life lessons and comedic situations the family found itself in. I always heard an echo of the lessons I did not receive through the television's screen. Theo was the kid who was the only male in his family and had to deal with pressures as the child of a successful African American family in New York that I could only imagine. And yet, he felt close to home, like a relative I had yet to meet. To hear about him drowning at the age of fifty-four made me very self-conscious (only a few years separated us). To lose a part of my childhood this way hurt tremendously.

And then there is Hogan...

Hulk Hogan was the most popular wrestler of the 1980s, and I refuse to think of him as a reality TV star or another casualty of the culture war we now live in (yes, he did support the current president; yes, he had made a lot of questionable comments). You must understand what it was like to hear him boast and take down his opponents while talking about all his little "Hulkamaniacs" looking up to him. I thought that I was one of them and felt like he could have been a role model worth emulating. But we must remember that we are all human and do very human things. He was one of the best the World Wrestling Federation ever allowed to suplex and land a piledriver.

Finally, there is John...

Ozzy Osbourne was the lead singer of the group that created heavy metal music (Black Sabbath) before leaving and having his own successful solo career...but you knew all of this already, didn't you? How could you not? I have heard their music all over radio stations where I never heard them before, including a call-in show on CBC Radio One (the host made me laugh by including a snippet of "Sweet Leaf" after one interview - rather appropriate sonic touch for Canadian media). My introduction to his work came in the basement of a friend I made when I moved to the suburbs...and I laughed. The first cover I saw had a baby with green eyes, red skin, horns, and yellow fingernails (it was "Born Again"). How could I possibly take it seriously? Well, I eventually learned that their work was the backbone of a lot of the hard rock and grunge that was soon to come, and Ozzy did deserve praise for making it out of his rough childhood and giving the world a sound that would change the game forever.

So, three lives and three different feelings. There is not much more I can add here except to say that time goes on, loss comes from living a life, and that my memories will go on...

Listen, laugh, and learn.

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You can find more poems, stories, and articles by Kendall Defoe on my Vocal profile. I complain, argue, provoke and create...just like everybody else.

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