My Bob. I’m not able to settle for that he’s gone. I’m not going to say goodbye but.
I think about him on the market, nonetheless on the highway, doing what he loves with all his coronary heart and humor. He’s standing on stage, killing! One other two-hour set in entrance of a pair hundred of the luckiest folks on the planet. They’re laughing so exhausting they weep. And simply once they catch their breath, he grabs his guitar and slays them with certainly one of his musical closers. There’s an encore, and one other, and one other. Everybody right here needs an encore with Bob.
He calls his one real love, Kelly [Rizzo], and tells her about his present. He says he feels 26 once more, alive, then asks her to repair up an image he needs to publish, and she or he says it doesn’t want fixing and tells him how good-looking he's. He says he loves her with each little bit of his coronary heart. And when he will get to the lodge to place his head on the pillow, he misses his daughters, his household and his mates.
God, he loves us all a lot. Bob goes to sleep dreaming of once we’ll meet once more — and he’s smiling. I do know in my coronary heart he’s smiling, nonetheless listening to the laughter from just a few hours earlier than.
He ought to nonetheless be on the market difficult himself creatively, stripping down all of the Hollywood bull—, touring to small cities across the nation, giving the folks uncooked, wild, unpredictable, and uncensored Saget. “Tonight’s specials are cake and cock … and we’re out of cake.”
Once I noticed his final Instagram publish, my first thought was he appeared too “alive” to die just a few hours later. However I suppose that’s proper. We must always all wish to “die alive.” We don’t wish to be stuffed with remorse and regret, forgotten and discarded. We wish to be overwhelmed with the privilege and bounty of doing what we do greatest. Bob felt younger, energized, grateful and appreciated. The applause and laughter didn’t have time to die down earlier than Bob did. He by no means ran out of cake … or the opposite stuff. He died brilliant and fierce.
Personally, I hope to die after a fantastic evening of lovemaking with my spouse, however I’m glad Bob didn’t go that means. As I mentioned, I reasonably he dies after doing what he did greatest. (Sorry, Kelly.) That’s the sort of joke Bob liked.
It’s exhausting to elucidate who Bob was to me personally with out understanding that he’s your Bob too.
The worldwide ocean of affection for him has been unbelievable. Although it’s been exhausting for me to take a look at the tributes, tales, journal covers, tens of millions of social media posts, I really feel everybody out there may be getting it proper, saying the proper factor, remembering Bob in these outstanding methods.
I simply want he knew how a lot the world liked him when he was right here. I spent many an evening making an attempt to persuade him of how liked he actually was (or possibly it was the opposite means round — him making an attempt to persuade me how liked he was). However that was simply Bob bluster. There’s no means he thought his dying would have this sort of influence. That is the sort of protection that speaks to somebody who genuinely related with folks, and never only for a second, however for generations.
I even noticed an article titled: “What Bob Saget meant to immigrant youngsters.” It spoke of how he struck a chord amongst many immigrant kids and the way they discovered to talk English from him. Now, I am keen on my Bob Saget however … actually? Actually? I can simply hear a bunch of youngsters operating round saying: “I like my mom, and you may too for $12.”
One of many nice honors of my life is being related to him at this second in time.
I’ve gotten 1000's of texts, emails and calls talking to our 35-year friendship, telling me how sorry they had been for my loss. Individuals have even despatched flowers like I misplaced my spouse or one thing. Come to think about it, once we had been collectively, we had been like an previous, married couple: all bickering, no intercourse.
Final summer season, Bob and Dave [Coulier] and I did a private look collectively. It was a high-pressure gig coping with COVID protocols and all. And let’s keep in mind, Bob performed a dust-busting neat freak. Typecasting? Yup — so he was additional … let’s name it neurotic? We had been somewhat exhausting on one another, and poor Dave was smack dab in the course of it, getting it from either side as he had been for the final 35 years. I felt horrible and instantly apologized to Bob. However he was surprisingly quiet. I hadn’t heard from him for just a few days, which was a very long time to not have heard from Bob.
Lastly, on my birthday, Bob began texting me like loopy, asking if I’d learn his publish about me on Instagram. In truth, I used to be a tad over Bob in the intervening time, however I figured I wanted to learn it so he’d cease bugging me. This was his publish:
To say we're like brothers is an understatement. Now we have been by a lot collectively for 35 years. Excessive, lows — the standard you undergo along with your closest of individuals in your life. However what I've to say right here is how damned fortunate I'm to have John in my life. He has at all times been there for me, even after I could possibly be insufferable. There is just one @johnstamos on this planet, and I'm a greater particular person as a result of he’s in my life. Completely satisfied Birthday, Pricey John.
I may learn that on daily basis for the remainder of my life.
As legend goes, Bob and I didn’t actually get alongside once we began “Full Home.” We definitely had totally different types of appearing and the way we approached every scene. His: cracking barely inappropriate jokes that would typically land him in little “conferences” with the moms. However on the similar time, he began to show what an excellent comedic thoughts he had. Mine: obsessing over each second and looking for fact, deeper understanding, self-analysis and private reflection in each hug. (Dave simply handed fuel quite a bit.) It didn’t take lengthy for us to satisfy within the center and to respect one another professionally and creatively because the years glided by.
After we began “Full Home,” I used to be in my 20s and didn’t have a care on this planet. Hell, my yard was Disneyland. However life does what it does, and when issues got here crashing down, the final particular person on Earth I ever imagined could be my rock grew to become simply that. Once I misplaced my dad and mom, Bob was there for me like no different. He informed soiled jokes and talked about himself as he hosted my dad’s funeral. He was there by divorces, deaths, despair and darkish days. He was there by love, marriage, a baby and brilliant instances. He was my lifeline.
He liked exhausting and deep. (Cue Bob to make a joke out of “exhausting and deep.”) He would do that in tragedies and actually, it might piss me off typically. That’s how he received by the darkness, and sadly he had loads of it in his life. Now that I’m coping with him dying, I form of get it.
Bob liked with every little thing he had. He taught me to be current with those I like. I hope he discovered to internalize the love I felt for him.
My spouse Caitlin, who’s been extraordinary by all this, my son Billy, and everybody in my life will profit from Bob’s reward to me on daily basis. Billy will develop up with that depth of affection for the remainder of his life.
On the day of Bob’s dying, Billy was observing an image of Bob and I dressed like girls for a shoot for Individuals journal, replicating Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon from “Some Like It Sizzling.”
He was squinting his eyes and cocking his head, making an attempt to make sense out of the image. After a very long time, he mentioned, “Dad, who's that?” And I mentioned that’s your dad and your Uncle Bob in girls’s clothes. And he mentioned, “Why?”
“Nicely, son, I did it as a tribute to the movie … I can’t communicate for Bob.”
I pray that Billy will sometime have a pal like I had in Bob — and if I see an image of the 2 of them in tutus, I’ll comprehend it’s cohesion.
I grabbed Billy, held on to him as tight as I might and informed him how a lot I liked him. We don’t do justice to Bob’s legacy with out remembering to carry these we love as shut as we will and telling them what we really feel about them on daily basis.
Bob put all of it on the desk for us — leaving nothing behind.
When the information broke, I broke. I used to be shattered and felt nugatory to assist anybody else. However my supportive spouse picked me up, threw me within the automotive and drove to Bob and Kelly’s home. That’s what Bob would have completed if it had been the opposite means round. I slipped into the yard on my own. His final cigar was sitting in an ashtray by the jacuzzi. It was windy and balmy. I appeared as much as the sky and mentioned, “Child, please give me an indication from up there.” (I known as him Child as a result of that’s how he entered his data into my telephone years in the past.) “Inform me you’re alright. Inform me to not really feel dangerous.” I waited a couple of minutes. Nothing. Requested once more. Silence.
I used to be considering heaven, hell and heartbreak when rapidly a tiny hummingbird got here fluttering down from above and landed on a tree proper in entrance of me. (I swear that is true. I even took somewhat video with my telephone.)
I’ve at all times felt hummingbirds represented my dad and mom, and this one was undoubtedly my mom, who had crimson hair: She had brilliant crimson feathers round her neck like a shawl.
She assured me Bob was OK and to cease searching for goofy indicators. (How impolite!) Then she flew up and away. I need indicators from Bob, rattling it! I wish to be haunted by him! The void is frustrating!
Then this thought washed over me: Possibly, simply possibly, his soul is perhaps at peace? The one purpose to rattle the thunder and half the clouds is that you're stressed within the afterlife, proper? That you've got unfinished enterprise and haven’t mentioned what you wanted to say to those you like. Everyone knows that’s not Bob.
Possibly I have to cease searching for Bob within the sky and settle for that he’s simply the place he must be, peaceable, free, surrounded by the hummingbirds of previous souls at relaxation.
I don’t want Bob in another realm. He’s within the classes I train my son and the hilarious soiled tales that my spouse and I'll snort at for the remainder of our lives. Hell, I can Google him to life and listen to him any time, evening or day. And now I can pause or quick ahead him, which might have been unimaginable just a few instances whereas he was alive.
I’ve spent days refusing to let him go. However now I’m beginning to understand I don’t need to. I don’t need to say goodbye as a result of he’s by no means leaving my coronary heart. And I'll proceed to speak to him on daily basis and let him know what he means to me.
Bob, I'll by no means, ever have one other pal such as you. You'll at all times be my greatest pal. You're my new guardian angel — a guardian angel with the dirtiest mouth and a coronary heart as huge and benevolent as eternally.
I like you, Child.
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