Around 6:45 last night, I plopped down on the sofa and prepared to check my email one last time before the delivery guy from the Chinese place arrived and Gay Night officially began. (Gay Night, for you Normies–yeah, we call you Normies–is the night on which ANTM, Gossip Girl, and PR audiences turn off their cellies and watch fabulous train wrecks unfold on national television. They’re not especially different from the train wrecks you’d see on Rock of Love or Flavor of Love or whatever love show that mini-muncher Tequila is hosting now, but everything’s wrapped in gold lame. Or silk charmeuse. Always with the silk charmeuse.)
Anyway, I was sitting there with my laptop, and I happened to click open the New York Times, and there, splashed in the center of the page was the announcement that William F. Buckley is dead. And I thought to myself, “Holy! Freakin! Crap!” And then I thought, “Fiiiiinally!“
I let out a little squeal of delight, and I shouted the news to Jonno, which wasn’t really necessary since he was only about five feet away, but he was all, like, “Duh, it’s been up there all day.” And I know it’s grant season, and I know I’ve had my head down, cobbling together endless paragraphs of jargon–the kind that gets government panels absolutely soaking wet–but really, how did I miss news this big? Why didn’t my co-worker squeal with similar delight earlier in the day? (She’s free of grantwriting duties, and she totally hearts the Times and NPR all day long.) And for that matter, why didn’t any of you IM me to let me know? For shame.
I guess it’s not very nice to celebrate someone’s death, even when that someone was a complete freaking nightmare of ruination like la Buckley. And I know that soon–very soon–the death of mortal evil will be balanced by the death of mortal good. (Avoid ham sandwiches, Al Gore! Beware the Ides of March!) But for this brief shining moment, a part of me–perhaps a not-very-nice part of me–is happy that someone responsible for galvanizing a lot of hurtful ideology, someone with a pulpit who knew how to use it, someone admired by a worldwide audience of people who aren’t very fond of me or my ilk, is dead.
But why, oh why, couldn’t it have been Ann Coulter?
Maybe next year.
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