On April 25, 2009, my phone began to blow up with texts:
I’m so sorry for ur loss
RIP BEA 🙁
TYFBAF
It happened. I’d sensed it before it was even confirmed, but the news was official: Bea Arthur had passed away. My favorite Golden Girl was gone. Almost a year later, I would get her face tattooed on my arm above a laurel wreath and the words “Thank you for being a friend.” Dorothy Zbornak lives forever on my left bicep.
A world without Bea Arthur suddenly felt bleak. But self-soothing through Golden Girls repeats — even just as background noise (which actually proves tough because all I want to do is finish the character’s sentences) — made her death remarkably easier to digest. And after seven seasons’ worth of episodes I’ve seen hundreds of times (to quote…
