Weekend self-care open thread: Mama, I'm coming home

Death comes to us all. There is no avoiding that. If you've lived a good life and aren't famous, those who love you will remember you with fondness. If you've lived a bad life, well, you may have someone who loves you regardless, but most people will be glad to be rid of you.

This week we lost four tzaddiks, three men and one woman who impacted the world more than normal human ken. Malcolm Jamal Warner. Chuck Mangione. Ozzy Osbourne. And Dame Cleo Laine.

Although I wasn't a huge Ozzy fan, his omnipresence in my youth was inescapable. You couldn't help but like at least a few of his songs.

I remember my brother's record collection, in which Chuck Mangione was featured prominently. He would play those records for me, and they were my first introduction to jazz.

Dame Cleo Laine? A lioness of world jazz, and her father a veteran of British forces from World War I, prefiguring the Windrush Generation.

Malcolm Jamal Warner? As a Gen-Xer, that one hit me hard. Yes, I laughed at the peachy keen presentation of the Huxtables, as I was right to have done after the Bill Cosby revelations came out. But Malcolm was a child star who didn't fall into the usual traps of that stardom. And he was too young to have died, in a freak swimming accident.

All of these people gifted the world with something special. And that's all we can ask of anyone, including ourselves. They have left a legacy, and that's no small thing.

This weekend we will celebrate all who have passed. These four lights, and anyone else you want to honor in the comments.

Share those whom you want to honor, famous or not, in the comments.

As always, dear friends, be ever kind, gentle, and joyful with yourselves and those around you.