Jim Henson would've been seventy-five years old today.

If you didn't watch Sesame Street or The Muppets as a child, odds are you're an incomplete adult. And that's okay. That's what DVDs are for.

Some of the most important education you ever received, undoubtedly, was between the ages of 0 and 7 when the Muppets crew held their deepest influence on you. Not just alphabets (which they helped you learn) and counting (that, too) and colors (obviously) and shapes (yup)--not just typical things that come from books and classrooms and lesson plans so dutifully planned out.

No, the Muppets also taught you how to use your imagination and creativity--how to dream, how to pretend, how to find the quirks of intelligence so often neglected in grades K through 12. More than that, they taught you about feelings--not how to feel or what to feel--just that it was okay to feel, which is probably something your adult self has long battled trying to suppress for years. And it's something all of us could probably stand to have a little more of every day.

And all of that--the feelings, the imaginations, the creativity and whimsical daydreams of make-believe and pretending, of how to let your guard down and be just a little less self-conscious, a little less frightened, a little less on guard--a little more open to yourself and the world around you, whether that world was right beside you or halfway across the globe--was the result of Jim Henson.

He died twenty-one years ago at the much too young age of fifty-three. But his life continues through Big Bird and Fozzie Bear and Oscar the Grouch and Snuffleupagus and Miss Piggy. And, of course, Kermit. And for that, all of us should thank him.

The following is a video from Henson's memorial service about a week after he died, with all the puppeteers who worked with Jim singing a collection of his favorite Sesame Street songs. Go ahead. Try watching it around the 5-7 minute mark and not get a little frowny, or at the conclusion when all the puppets come out. Try.