Four years ago, Michael Nesmith died.
It still sounds strange to say out loud. The world is less quirky, brilliant, interesting than it's ever been before. Less rich and colorful, less punctuated with the sound of raucous laughter in response to his deadpan humor, always in that slow Texas drawl. A man who could fill the room with his presence while hardly saying a word.
Things aren't the same without Nez.
Not without his jokes, dryly told with a glint of mischief sparkling in his eye. Or without his wisdom, delivered at the most unexpected yet often most needed of moments.
Not without him to remind us of how ridiculous it all is.
The songs Nez wrote and sang are indelible in our memories and history, immortalized in the cultural canon and the fabric of so many people's lives. The music will endure, playing on, enfolding us, bringing us back to the days where it thrummed steadily in the background, a soundtrack to every joy and sorrow.
And we'll keep remembering the man who was Nez.
The friend we loved. The complicated hero we adored. The artist whose work we were drawn to, even if we didn't always know why. The perfectly imperfect human being who was Michael Nesmith, and who deserved a far better end to his story.
And if you close your eyes, you can still see him, somewhere beyond the blue horizon.
Miss you, Nez...
