Mukilteo Musings

A Little Bit of This and That About Johnny Carson

Wow! Johnny Carson died. His death makes me feel weird because he has been such a part of American culture. He was on the air from 1962 until 1992. I was only nine years old when the Tonight Show with him began and we had only had a TV for three years. When I was 39, he retired. My Dad was a little older than him and my Mom a little younger and like so many of that generation including my parents, they smoked. In the end, it was smoking that finally got Johnny Carson. Emphysema is a dreadful way to die because you slowly suffocate. The "cigarette" killed my Dad of a heart attack; so far, the "cigarette" hasn't killed my Mom because she is fighting it. After more than 40 years of smoking, she quit when the doctors found a spot of emphysema on her lungs. It has been 15 years now but her breathing is not as easy as it used to be.

I remember as a little girl spending the night with my best friend, Cathy. We would stay up and watch Johnny. He and his guests would smoke openly on the show during jokes and laughter. It was normal along with the cigarette commercials. Cathy's Dad died young from smoking, too. My uncle never did smoke and at 89 he is still alive, living at home, and up until last year he still hunted and bowled. Maybe Johnny could have lived another 10 or 15 years like Bob Hope did. Maybe my Dad and Cathy's Dad could have lived another 30 years. The world would be a better place with some of these great old guys hanging around a bit longer.

A good thing is that Johnny Carson during his retirement discovered the unsurpassed beauty of the Pacific Northwest. Polite mutterings would spread throughout the Puget Sound area that his yacht was sailing in the San Juan Islands just north of here. Hopefully, he saw our orcas; I'm sure he did. http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/artsentertainment/2002158924_mcfadden24m.html

Occasionally, he would pull his yacht into the Palisades Restaurant in Seattle to dine. http://pli.r-u-i.com/ Polite Seattleites recognizing his wish for privacy would never have bothered him for a photo or autograph.

So thank you, Johnny, for helping me survive with laughter those late nights with colicky babies. And sail into the sunrise with the orcas.


Gateway to the San Juans--photo taken this morning