John Mayer Says 'Grief Is a Journey' as He Remembers Friend Bob Saget 1 Year After He Died
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Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images Bob Saget and John Mayer
John Mayer is remembering his friend Bob Saget on the one-year anniversary of his death.
On Monday, the musician paid tribute to the late actor in a lengthy social media post by reflecting on their friendship — and how he felt after learning that his friend was no longer with him.
"One year ago today, we lost Bob Saget. I loved that guy. I love saying 'I loved that guy.' Soon after he left us, I couldn't finish those three words without falling apart, but now I say it with all the simplicity and complexity that love itself entails," Mayer, 45, wrote on Instagram, alongside a smiling photo of Saget.
"I knew he was otherworldly while he was here. Every moment we spent together was the stuff of Old Hollywood Magic, of dinners and drinks and stories and laughs and memories you knew were cutting deep grooves into your soul as the lathe was turning," he continued. "Grief is a journey, and it's a profound trip that someone you lose takes as well; they leave the space around you and slowly climb a staircase to find a space within you."
He concluded, "I miss him all the time, but those memories? They're solid objects. And today we'll take them out and hold them and trade them and remember how much Bob Saget meant to us. I loved that guy, and I always will."
Saget was found dead at the Ritz-Carlton in Orlando, Florida, on Jan. 9, 2021. One month later, his family confirmed that he died due to head trauma. He was 65.
His wife Kelly Rizzo and Full House costars Candace Cameron Bure, Jodie Sweetin and Dave Coulier also paid tribute to the star on Monday.
In September, the "Slow Dancing in a Burning Room" singer opened up to PEOPLE about his three-hour conversations with Saget that "spanned time and space."
"I'm thinking, like we all do, 'Well, that was a nice dinner. I can't wait to see him again,'" he said at the time. "But on my way home, [I'd get] a giant text that Bob had dictated into his iPhone, half of which was him railing on Siri. But these incredibly loving texts, after having sat with him for three hours, getting another text of this expression of kindness and love."
"He would take it in the car and go, 'I have to let that man know how special tonight was,' and that's the legacy for me," he said of Saget. "To just let people know as much as you can, not just that you love them, but that the things that you do together are meaningful. I don't think we let each other know how meaningful these things are."
"To be able to write someone, and go, 'Hey, I'm really glad I met you,' you know, some of those things hit even harder than some of the more didactic things," Mayer continued. "He just really appreciated the meaning of life and the meaningfulness of life."
He also said the aspects of his late friend that remained with him are Saget's "kindness, caring, absurdity, mixed with love," and his ability to hold onto the "silliness" we "all lose" as we get older. "He reminded me every time that, 'Yes, John, you can afford to be a little sillier if you've got love in your heart,'" he said about the actor. "It was this great mix of silliness, absurdity, and a deep, deep undercurrent of love."
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Meanwhile, in June, he appeared on Netflix's Dirty Daddy: The Bob Saget Tribute with some of Saget's closest friends and recalled a dream he had about the comedian.
"The other night, I had a dream and I woke up crying because I saw Bob," the "Wild Blue" singer said. "It was young Bob, and we were about to go into a restaurant. And I knew and he didn't know. I looked right at him and said, 'You gotta know how much I love you.' He went, 'Yeah, I know. Fine.'"
Mayer said he then "woke up, of course, crying like a baby," but found himself still talking to Saget.
"I remember I had to go back to sleep because I had something very important the next day, and I said out loud, 'I love you, Bob, but I gotta go back to sleep.' And I heard him say, 'Go back to sleep, go back to sleep. You have to go back to sleep. You have to. You've got stuff tomorrow. You've gotta go back to sleep,'" he said in his best impression of Saget.
"And that's no different than the magic of when he was around," Mayer added. "And I learned that. It is not a jump to go from here to there. Because there's nothing different about the way we access the people we love when they're there than when they're here. And that is the magic of Bob Saget that keeps carrying on for me."
