Associated Press
Michael Jackson, backstage at the 1984 Grammy Awards, with his eight trophies.
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Jenice Armstrong: Through it all, loving Michael
DON'T THESE Michael Jackson lyrics sound as if he wrote them for precisely this sad, sad moment?
"Gone too soon. Like a comet. Blazing 'cross the evening sky. Gone too soon. . . ."
I have to stop . . .
I'd be lying if I said I was completely surprised. I always believed that Michael Jackson would die young, like Elvis Presley. It was just a hunch. I knew it just like I know the words of so many of his hit songs.
When I'm not fighting back tears, I feel like arguing and railing.
I find it odd that people are carrying on as if something monumental hasn't just happened. Don't they get it? I wanted to argue with the young woman who giggled and told Michael Jackson jokes while I was standing slack-jawed, processing the news that Michael Jackson really was dead.
But then, I had to remind myself that this young woman isn't old enough to have grown up with him, like so many of the rest of us. She didn't grow up listening to his music or making up dance routines to his songs. She never wrote letters to him, screamed at his concerts until she was hoarse or sat bewildered and dismayed as he lightened his skin and went through all of his legal troubles with young boys.
The first time I saw him perform, I was in elementary school. My mother waved me over to our big old black-and-white TV to watch a singing group called the Jackson 5. All I remember was a group of black brothers and a whole lot of poofy hair on stage, bouncing up and down. This was the 1970s, and afros were the rage. Michael was outfront doing his signature thing. I couldn't take my eyes off him. He was magnetic.
I was a goner after that. I became a rabid, diehard fan. I must have been an annoying pest, since I had the habit of telling anyone who'd listen how he was my favorite. I used to buy teen magazines just to pore over pictures of him. When he came to town, our dad took us to one of his concerts. I fantasized that he was singing directly to me.
I never let go of that, even as he began changing his face through plastic surgery and acting increasingly eccentric. Think what you want, but I stayed a loyal fan for decades, even when it was no longer cool and he'd become a laughingstock. Yeah, he was wacky. But I held out hope that the shy, talented boy I'd watched grow into a complex, tormented man was just somehow misunderstood. I held out hope, even when all the signs pointed in an unthinkably ugly direction.
I'm annoyed that the caricature he became is all that some people will remember about Michael Jackson. They'll joke about his pet monkey, that hyperbaric chamber and the sleepovers he admitted to having with minors.
And that's a shame. One of the first black superstars, he managed to transcend race at a time when racial roadblocks were a whole lot higher than they are now. He had a Barack Obama-type appeal that crossed racial boundaries.
What I hope is that people will also remember that he was only human. Supremely talented, but a person with flaws like the rest of us.
"Born to amuse; to inspire; to delight; Here one day; gone one night; like a sunset; dying with the rising of the moon; gone too soon; gone too soon." *
