George Carlin

Rest in peace.

I cannot convey the grief that I have for the single greatest person of inspiration in my life. I believe that comedy is the best way to handle life. Comedy allows smiles to be formed from the worst scenarios. No one was better than George at taking the inane or mundane details and hypocrisies of everyday life and turning them on their heads for all to view, question and laugh at. George is the reason why I majored in Sociology. George is the reason that I view the world in the way that I do.

In his comedy, behind the slew of abrasiveness and cynicism existed a true understanding and appreciation of the world around him. He made no bones about the things that annoyed him, and in a rare deviation from the norm, instead of rejecting those things, he embraced them, analyzed them in an effort to make every little thing better.

While I realize that the last thing that George would want is some fan gushing over his works during his postmortem, but it's more than that. His works reflected an attitude that will never be seen again; A unique perspective on how things are, how they should be, and how they should be appreciated.

Everyone will take something else from George's commentary on society, but to me it was the most life-shaping perspective that I have run into in my first 25 years on this planet.