Goodbye Gonzo
In Memoriam: Hunter S. Thompson, 1937-2005
By Diami J. Virgilio
February 22, 2005
“He’s gone,” said Bunsen, emerging gravely from the operating room.
“I did everything I could, but he’d done too much damage.” Bunsen ambled over to his leather office chair and sat down, a deep sigh forming in his breast.
“What did he say,” said Rolf. He’d known him, or rather, he’d taken the time to know him better than a lot of people.
“He…didn’t really say anything that we know of,” said Bunsen. “At least, not yet. I wasn’t there at the very end, but Beaker was there right after. I don’t know. Beaker called and told me what happened, but that’s all.”
Bunsen hadn’t spoken to Beaker in years. They’d had a falling out over Beaker’s sideline gig of dealing to other Muppets. The two of them had spent the years before Bunsen went into private practice in the lab developing innovative chemicals and compounds. When he turned the lab over to beaker, Bunsen never dreamed that those chemicals might be doled out for profit. Now here was Beaker’s number one client, dead from self-inflicted wounds. Did Beaker know anything about what drove his client over the edge? If he did, he wasn’t saying.
Suddenly, the door flew open and in rushed a tear-strewn Ms. Piggy, Kermit trailing behind trying to restrain her.
“Is it true?! It’s not true! Tell me it isn’t true,” she screamed.
“I’m sorry Piggy,” said Bunsen.
“Oh no…no, not him. He was just a clown. He was always a clown. Why would he do this thing? Oh Kermy…”
Piggy fell into her amphibian lover’s slender arms. Kermit had never been comfortable with the flirtations between his portly mistress and the wild and unpredictable clown they’d come to mourn. Kermit thought he was an idiot. More than an idiot, he was reckless. He always said the wrong thing as loud as he could, which angered Kermit who prized discretion above all things. Still, the others looked to him for leadership, so it fell to him to say something that would eulogize the fallen fool.
“Gonzo was a…difficult creature at times,” Kermit began. “He lived hard and fast and never tried to deny what he was, which was…different from everyone else.”
In a corner, Animal started to softly weep. When Gonzo was around, he wasn’t so crazy. He wasn’t so weird. Now with Gonzo gone, there was no one to launch into protective polemics about “freak power.” Animal was just a monster and everyone would know it. Kermit wouldn’t tolerate his antics without Gonzo shielding him.
“Gonzo had a lot to say and didn’t mince any words in saying it,” Kermit continued. “He was one of our own and we mourn him as such. For those questioning his death, the way he lived his life stands as the explanatory note for why he…well, why he might have decided to leave. I think if he were here now, he’d say--”
“He’d say you’re full of ****,” said Fozzy, obstinately staggering through the open door.
“What is this? Fozzy, are you drunk?”
“Go to Hell, Kermit. You’re always trying to come off so cool and detached. Well, this is Gonzo we’re talking about here. Gonzo wasn’t detached, man. He lived what he said. This guy was worth six of any of us.”
“Fozzy, go tell a joke. Hell, you are a joke. You and that bastard Gonzo were always jokes.”
“Why Kermit, huh? Why, because his antics didn’t fit into your smug sense of how a Muppet should act? Because he refused to let you turn him into a cheap parody? No, Gonzo gave us too much to become a victim of your spin and bull****.”
“Fozzy, you don’t even know what you’re saying”
“I know exactly what I’m saying frog. Gonzo wasn’t afraid to fight for the weird. While the rest of us were screwing around on Sesame, he was down in the trenches of Fraggle Rock. You think you’re some big shot Kermit, but you’re just a toady to the puppeteers. Gonzo never relented, never compromised. He just got a little tired, that’s all. He just…he wasn’t perfect, you know? He exaggerated sometimes and didn’t always treat everyone so great, but that doesn’t make him not worth honoring for what he did. That son of a bitch raked the muck up from every dark hole we tried to avoid. He was a pioneer, not just some goddamn fictional character.”
The small assemblage was starting to feel emboldened by Fozzy’s drunken ramble. It reminded Rolf of the spontaneous no-turning back tunes he and Gonzo used to cook up and then attempt to sing. Animal grew calm and started to realize being a monster might not be so bad. As Gonzo would’ve said, “Well, so what?” Kermit sat in a corner, simmering contemptuously.
“Oh Fozzy,” blurted Piggy. “What are we going to do without him?”
“It’s okay Piggy,” replied Fozzy, his eyes gleaming with zeal. “He got the ball rolling. He proved the Evil Kneivel stunts could be done without a helmet so we wouldn’t have to…and he got that it was just a dumb cruel joke. Look at the way things are now. Why the hell would he want to stick around for that when he’d picked up the punch line years ago when the *******s were twice as mean? So what do we do Piggy? We remind everyone that it’s still a joke, and when they pick it up and run with it like they always do, we laugh like hell. We look back at our strings and hand holes and we laugh like there was no goddamn tomorrow!”
(C) Diami J. Virgilio, 2005
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