The Rainbow Connection

I’m sitting here trying to write a review of Tim Burton’s Alice In Wonderland. Earlier I mentioned to the group I was with that somehow Burton had turned Alice into Dorothy and Wonderland into Oz. As I typed that line down, it sparked a memory of a Muppet Show episode starring Brooke Shields where the Muppets performed scenes from Alice in Wonderland. Fozzie Bear, in his typical fashion, misses the point entirely and dons a Tin Man costume that ultimately leads them to end the show singing “We’re off the see the wizard”.

My mind has a way for fluttering back and forth between things, in a way I’m certain they have a clinical name for, but I stopped typing and loaded up YouTube to find it. Watching the episode led me to a CBS special aired shortly after Jim Henson’s passing, a tribute to the man and his work, which finally led me to the various videos from his memorial service.

I never knew the man personally, but those videos never fail to to choke me up inside, as if I had lost an actual family member.

This year marks 20 years since his death and next year would have marked Jim’s 75th birthday. He once said “When I was young, my ambition was to be one of the people who made a difference in this world. My hope still is to leave the world a little bit better for having been here.”

Mission accomplished.

Jim Henson
1936 – 1990