I had a fever. I wasn't well and couldn't think straight, but since I was under 10, I wasn't scared. I've been sick before and I got better. My parents weren't worried, the family dog ​​was on the opposite end of the couch in the living room, and the television dial was set to The Movie Channel. While my friends were stuck in an overheated classroom learning cursive writing by heart like a pack of healthy leeches, I drifted in and out of consciousness as movies played on a cathode ray tube nestled in a carved wooden nook eight feet away. . I don't remember if I had a sore throat or a persistent cough. I remember being happy and hungry for sensations. This was my happy place.

At this age, I had seen enough movies to know that they weren't all going to be Jaws or Airplane!—which, in my young mind, represented the pinnacle of cinema. I knew all about the Academy Awards and followed which films were nominated for Oscars. I remember in 1980 finding it strange that two black-and-white films were nominated for Best Picture, and I wasn't inclined to see them for this very reason. But on this sick day, the programmers at The Movie Channel determined that I would spend my afternoon watching David Lynch "The Elephant Man."

I wasn't completely averse to the idea. Grotesque makeup design by Christopher Tucker gave Lynch's film the appeal of a monster movie. Having seen most of Universal's horror classics from the 1930s and 1940s by this point, I could relate to a black and white film if it had a hideous creature lurking about. In fact, I approached The Elephant Man like a freak show. Two hours later, with temperatures north of 100 degrees, the world was a very different place.

When I learned through a flood of texts yesterday afternoon that David Lynch had died, I felt unmoored from reality. Although the recent disclosure of the long-time smoker's diagnosis of emphysema forced us to consider a world without further surrealist excursions from the sui generis director, I still could not fathom that an artist so vital and boundlessly inventive was mortal. Since I was in the middle of writing a thank you to Bob Uecker just passedI didn't have the mental space to adjust to this new reality. But before I dive into the sardonic brilliance of Uecker's Harry Doyle in "Major League," I gave myself a moment. And at that moment, fighting back tears in the middle of a public library, I laid back on that couch, sick as a dog, watching The Elephant Man.

It's been decades since I last saw The Elephant Man, but I could still recall the memory of that nightmarish opening sequence where John Merrick's mother is attacked by a herd of elephants. Should I have considered this incident responsible for Merrick's deformities? Hallucinating easily, I was probably more confused than terrified; I know I've never seen a studio film pull off something so weird before that it held my attention for at least another ten minutes.

In the film's first conventionally staged scene, we are taken through a freak show from the perspective of Dr. Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins), who is curious to see why the police have been called to shut down one of the exhibits. An ambitious surgeon learns that an attraction called the Elephant Man is causing a stir. When he learns that this creature is so inappropriate that it is considered indecent for public viewing, he returns later to pay the beast's owner handsomely for a private show.

Lynch masterfully treats Treves's visit as a set piece of suspense, with the handler leading the doctor down a dark corridor and into a room that slowly glows with firelight to reveal Merrick in all his unspeakable ugliness. Lynch pushes Hopkins, who instead of gasping, shed a tear. He is moved by this man's condition and, we assume, wants to help him.

The viewer doesn't get a proper introduction to Merrick until half an hour into the film, by which point we've seen him exposed for the observant refinement of Treves' colleagues and exploited again by a hospital editor. After so much build-up, the Merrick we imagined would be far more monstrous than the one whose appearance elicited a bloodcurdling scream from the unsuspecting nurse—at least that's how it felt to me on that couch. From that moment on, The Elephant Man enthralled me as much as I had been throughout star wars trench finale.

I'm not a parent, but I was once a child, and I firmly believe that many children can handle disturbing subject matter provided the director shows restraint and compassion. While Lynch doesn't shy away from the cruelty heaped upon Merrick (his kidnapped return to the freak show in the third act is particularly poignant), the kindness he displays, allowing him to come out of his shell and reveal himself as a human being brimming with potential , is what reverberates long after the credits roll. At this basic level, The Elephant Man is ideal viewing for children.

What makes it essential is the Lynch of it all. The aforementioned prologue, Merrick's journey to the pantomime, and his passage into the cosmos are wondrous and mysterious in equal measure. That he hastens death by removing the pillows from the bed in the final scene may prompt some questions from discerning youngsters, but there's no better way to end this Lynchian primer with an answer: "I don't know." That's right, kids. It's up to you to figure it out, and what's more, there's no wrong answer. When asked if Merrick went to heaven, again, he softly replied, "I don't know." And if you don't want to ask these questions, I have the perfect solution: let them watch it for themselves.

That's what I did on a winter afternoon some 40 years ago, and it was this memory that calmed my soul as I took my first uncertain steps forward into the world. where David Lynch is now a memorial – one that will last forever because nothing will die.