By JOHN KANELIS / johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Well, what does one say about a birthday commemorating one of modern culture’s most iconic figures?

Happy birthday? Sure, why not?

Today is John Lennon’s 80th birthday. You’ve heard of him, yes? He founded the band that in the early 1960s transformed popular music forever. Their music still stands, nearly six decades later.

John Lennon was my favorite Beatle. I guess it had something to do with our shared names. Hey, I was a kid when The Beatles stormed across the Atlantic Ocean.

Over the ensuing years — brief as they were — The Beatles helped raise me. I have said for years that John Lennon and  his pals were a big part of my life. He and his best pal in the group, Paul McCartney, wrote arguably the most classic music of that — or perhaps any — cultural era.

John Lennon’s life ended tragically. We’re going to mark that date in December, 40 years after that a**hole shot John to death in front of his wife and at the front door of his New York City apartment complex. Not too many years ago, my wife and I visited NYC. We stood in front of the Dakota Building where John’s life ended; we walked through Central Park and saw the Strawberry Fields exhibit dedicated to John Lennon’s memory. It all filled with me with profound sadness.

John Lennon was a complex man, but oh how he could write and then sing the songs that will last until the end of time.

I miss him to this day.

Happy birthday, John … and thank you for helping me grow up along the way.