We Americans…and many throughout the world…are experiencing a phenomenon known as “collective grief”. Reading the social media comments, the magazine articles, and watching the video testimonies pour in about the life and death of Dolly Parton, it is almost unfathomable in this day and age that there is this enormous expression of collective grief.
Our American life together is splintered, as over the last decade we have developed so many channels of communication and specialization that we may never again experience something like this. We have so many choices for entertainment in our lives that TV programs that once garnered 15 or 20 million viewers now have an audience of 2 million. Musical artists that used be in Billboard’s Top Ten are still there, but far, far fewer people recognize their music or even their names. The advent of the internet brought us smaller and smaller niche audiences (Taylor Swift excluded, she is in her own realm!) and therefore “fandoms” are far smaller than they used to be, and we have fewer conversations around the work water cooler about some episode of TV the night before, or about the upcoming concert in the area.
Having so many options is a wonderful thing. Do you love Legos? There’s a Facebook page for that! Do you adore an indie artist? Find their Instagram account and follow! Do you want to travel specifically to Spain as a solo 70 year old woman? There’s an app for that!
But there is something to be said about the world stopping and noting the passing of someone who had a large impact on the world, or whose genuine and authentic love of people is so obvious solely because EVERYONE is feeling this death a little bit, regardless of whether they are Republican or Democrat, gay or straight, white or black…all are gathering around the virtual campfire telling stories about Dolly, listening to her songs, and paying their respects. It reminds us of our own humanity, and the how beneath our differences, there is an awful lot the same.
We may seldom see in our lifetimes the kind of expressions of loss of a public figure that we are seeing right now, but it sure is nice that something finally came along and cut through the noise, drawing us closer to one another, and encouraging us to stop with the rudeness, the infighting, and the name calling so that we can co-exist reasonably well alongside one another. We used to be a little gentler…like Dolly. We used to be a little more caring…like Dolly. We used to be respectful of others even if we disagreed with them…like Dolly.
Maybe collective grief is better for us than we realized.
In Light and Love,
Rev. Cindy
