Death Letter

I can't say I was really a fan of Heath Ledger, but I found him likable enough and a good enough actor that I enjoyed him in movies.

For some reason, his death really made me sad today. I actually cried and I don't usually cry when famous people die. I think it's the idea of his little girl growing up without him. He seemed like a decent guy and a good dad. And it's always sad when someone dies so young and at the height of his or her career.

I made the mistake of going to a celebrity gossip site after hearing just a mention of his death on BBC America World News. I was mortified that the site had pictures of his body being removed from his building and a disgusting article about how much apartments rent for in his building. I am disgusted. I guess that's what I get. I just wondered how or why he died? I didn't need to know any other morbid details or know the square footage of the vacant apartment in his building and how much it rents for. In other words, I didn't need them to revel in the death of a successful person so some mediocre columnist at a third-rate gossip site could make himself feel better.

More and more, I find myself disgusted with this culture of celebrity gossip, the cult of personality. Is it any wonder poor Britney Spears can't keep it together? God bless her, but I know she had no idea what it is like to be a mother and all the responsibility it entails. It doesn't sound as though her mother did a very good job mothering her or her sister. And then every mistake the poor girl makes is blown out of proportion and put in neon lights for all the world to see.

I can attest to the fact that once you start doubting your parenting skills and making mistakes, if you don't believe in yourself it can all go to hell really fast. And there's no way that poor girl could believe in herself with the entire world judging her.

Again, I'm no fan of her as a singer or entertainer, but damn! I feel for her and any other mother out there whose day to day life is examined and judged in the way that hers is.

All that said, Miss Girl needs to get it together and she clearly needs help doing so.

But I ask, who are the childless 20-something writers at the gossip magazines to judge? And who are we, really? I mean, we all make mistakes. Every one of us probably has some stupid thing we've done – as a parent, a friend, a wife, a lover, a member of society – that we wish we could undo. But it's not our place to judge others. As hard as that may be. Trust me. It's a particular weakness of mine that I've struggled to overcome and I fail often. But I don't want anyone judging me for all the stupid things I've done, do, and am likely to do again. So, I try to work on it.

My apologies for going off on a tangent there, but obviously these issues have struck a nerve for some reason. I guess I'm just feeling my mommy-ness right now and these two situations just strike me as very, very sad for all the children involved and I find it disgusting that the celebrity media don't seem to take those babies into consideration when they're writing disparaging things about the parents or showing heartbreaking photos. You'd think they were raised by wolves.