This tragedy is all over the internet and my workplace. It bothers me for personal reasons, but I think James Taylor summed it up quite eloquently.
"I felt two things immediately when I got the news last night:
first that the light had dimmed and, on its heels, a sense that this was inevitable; that Robin had lived for a long time with a darkness at the periphery of his vision.
What must it have been like to be present when he improvised the genie in "Aladdin" or Lovelace in "Happy Feet?" His Texan, his gay stylist, his Soviet comedian, Mrs. Doubtfire…He was a one-man menagerie.
Perhaps, just as we were swept away, so was he.
I remember the small, uncontrollable chuckle that often accompanied his flights of fancy; as if he were as amazed as we were by what was happening to him.
Who can pretend to understand a gift like
Robin Williams's? Meteoric, volcanic, fast and furious…Perhaps there is a price for such brilliance.
I'm so sad he's gone and so grateful he left us so much." ~
James Taylor
Another quote that has stuck with me is allegedly from Jack London;
I would rather be ashes than dust!
I would rather that my spark should burn out
in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dry-rot.
I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom
of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet.
The function of man is to live, not to exist.
I shall not waste my days trying to prolong them.
I shall use my time.