Don't Stop Til You Get Enough

Today, the world lost perhaps the finest entertainer we have ever known.

I lost my first love.

Michael Jackson.

As a child, Michael was real to me. He visited me at home, we ate peas at the dinner table together, we danced around the living room--my mom even left him in the car once when we went grocery shopping. It elicited a screechy "Mom! You left Michael in the car!!!" She dutifully turned around, opened the back door, and let Michael out, lest anyone in the parking lot think she was locking a little brother in the car on a hot day.

I remember seeing Michael Jackson moonwalk on TV for the first time, his glitter glove aglow. I remember digging my hand into a bag of popcorn, completely enthralled. My boyfriend was on the teevee! And he floated! The man may go down as the greatest dancer in history.

My brother brought home the 13-minute VHS tape of Thriller, thinking I'd be overjoyed. What I remember is sitting in front of our giant floor TV set (which made that signature ga-thunka, ga-thunka sound when you twisted the dial), hands over my eyes (but still peeking a little), screaming, "That's not my Michael! He wouldn't scare me like that!" Of course, subsequent viewings of the mini-movie thrilled me, like most people, to no end.

I am still the first person on the dance floor when those first bass lines begin to groove on Billie Jean. I unapologetically love We Are the World, Bad, Dangerous, Leave Me Alone. I love him without irony. Throughout his scandals, the disappearance of his face, his strange, sad publicity grabs, I still thought he was one of the most talented people alive.

I feel sad for him. Being the most famous person in the world for at least a decade—a decade of excess, no less—must be lonely. Despite his fame, he always had this melancholy air, this arrested development. Someone worked himself to death, adoring millions, but still feeling fundamentally misunderstood.

The man in the mirrored aviator glasses, military jackets, highwater pants (only he could make those cool), and the glittery glove. The man whose hair caught afire during the filming of a Pepsi commercial. He brought us the bizarre, the spectacular, the sublime. The man who completely overdelivered on his moniker, fulfilled his title as the King of Pop.

His genius made him unreal, untouchable. We stayed home when he launched new worldwide singles. (I particularly remember Black or White.) Everyone was always talking about him the next day, but fame took a toll. He was obviously, seriously mentally ailing. Eventually, we saw less and less of the genius, and more and more of a man in need of help. A sad genius recluse, looking more and more like a freakish wax statue, bankrupted financially and socially.

When I saw TMZ was reporting his cardiac arrest, I thought. It's not possible. It's not real. Then I thought, he'll be OK. Then I thought, uh-oh, number 3.

Tonight, I imagine him walking up the stairs to a great forever, each step alight as his foot touches it, a little further away from us mortal beings.

I don't want to think of it as it is: A mere slip of his former self, he died uneventfully. Like most of us.

Edited to add: After I wrote this, I saw this article at NPR. I wish I had written it.

Don't Throw Your Hand

This has been a really terrible week, not going to lie.

At least once a day (sometimes more) this week—no exaggeration—I have heard bad news, the really serious kind of bad, not the "oh that's irritating" kind of bad. It gets put in perspective when it's homes, natural disasters, jobs, deaths, unkindnesses and injustices in an already ugly time.

I'm drained, peeps. A lot of it is stuff I don't feel I have license to write about here—I'm sorry, I don't like being cryptic or hanging the "I've got a secret" thing out there—just because they are stories that belong to friends and family, and they probably wouldn't appreciate them broadcast here and they came to me as a confidant. A lot of loss this week. A lot.

Among the things I can talk about here are the fact that one of my favorite teachers died this week. I have had horrible stomachaches every day. I have had to comfort people when I had no words of advice or helpfulness. It has been 40 below all week. (I know I'm Minnesotan, but this is getting inhumane.) I have two pairs of socks on. Two. I have my scarf on. In my house.

I'm feeling the weight of the world these days. I feel sad. I feel like there's a lot to think about, absorb. I feel misunderstood, on some levels. I feel helpless. I feel like these are supposed to be the years I've worked for, planned my successes for, and I feel like I look around and the world is crashing down.

I feel like I can't even clearly articulate it.

I have had some really high highs and low lows over the past year, and mostly I have felt good, loved, motivated, and more optimistic (or at least hopeful for change) than I ever have. But this week has so missed the mark, in a huge way. This is an ugly time, and I feel sad that all my peers, and people that I love deeply, are hurting, struggling. I don't want to start 2009 like this at all.