From River Phoenix to Liam Payne

Inspired by the events of this past week.

A couple of days ago as I jumped in my car to head to an event, I heard the breaking news that Liam Payne, singer and former member of boy-band One Direction, had passed away. He had fallen from a balcony at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Liam Payne was only 31 years old.

I was shocked and knew the world would be as well. What I hadn’t counted on was my reaction over the coming days. I wasn’t a One Direction fan. I mean, I knew their music. I would have had to have been living under a rock not to know their commercial hits. And I roughly knew the members of the band. Harry Styles seems to have had the most success with a solo career but I could be wrong as I wasn’t paying that much attention. But Liam? I don’t think I could have named him or picked him out of a line-up.

Yet I’ve been brought to tears on many occasions over the past two days reading posts about him, especially from those who knew and loved him. I do cry at the drop of a hat so that partly explains…