I am rarely affected when celebrities pass away. I was not at all affected when Michael Jackson died and I actually felt the media coverage for him was way over the top which resulted in poor Farah Fawcett being overshadowed. However, I felt an overwhelming sadness about the passing of Patrick Swayze. Yes, I know that there are people dying everyday or suffering disease and that people are losing their loved ones all the time. But when I heard that he had finally succumbed to his illness that he so bravely fought, I was left feeling a little numb. I found myself watching one of my all time favourite movies last week, Ghost, and my goodness, the tears were in overdrive, especially at the end of the movie where Sam says to Molly “It’s amazing Molly, the love inside, you take it with you” and then he disappears into heaven with the angels. It just seems now that life is imitating art. I cannot imagine what his wife is going through right now and my heart simply goes out to her.
Patrick Swayze as we best remember him
Patrick Swayze was someone most people of my generation grew up with and women adored him. To me, he was one of the good guys of Hollywood – no airs and graces about him and he possessed pure down to earth charisma. The man oozed sex appeal, charm, vigour and valour and he was simply too young to die right now. It is hard to comprehend that he is no longer a living person. He poised us with his masculinity, grace and sensitivity and boy oh boy, he was one good looking fella. Who can forget those sexy dance moves in Dirty Dancing, the heroic southern soldier in North and South and the classic pottery love scene with Demi Moore in Ghost? Patrick Swayze appeared to be a man who can do anything he set his mind to – dance, sing, act and write. He was also a skilled outdoorsman – he rode horses and he was most comfortable at home on his ranch with his many animals. I became a fan of Patrick Swayze, like most other girls of my generation, when he appeared playing the broody, sexy dancing instructor Johnny Castle in Dirty Dancing.
Most of all I have always greatly admired the loving relationship he had with his real life leading lady, his wife and soul mate of 34 years, Lisa Niemi. I find it so endearing that he has been with the same woman for all these years after having met her when she was a 15 year old student at his mother’s dance studio. With todays divorce rates sky – high let alone celebrity divorces, it was admirable to see such loyalty and love by a man who could have easily picked and choosed any woman he desired, particularly when his career was at its peak after Dirty Dancing and Ghost. Call me old fashioned and sentimental, but I do wish there were more men like him out there.
Let me leave you with a beautiful video of Patrick and his wife dancing together at the World Music Awards in 1994. This is truly a memorable piece of footage and it demonstrates the enormous amount of talent they had as dancers and just how in-sync they were together. I cannot even begin to imagine the pain she is going through right now with the loss of her dancing partner and soul-mate. The world has lost a huge talent and I like to believe that, just like in the movie Ghost, his spirit lives on. RIP.
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