It's Complicated

I landed at Dulles airport and the crew told us about the death of Michael Jackson.  It was a sad way to cap a good trip; it made me realize that LA and MJ are kind of linked for me.

When I lived in LA the first time the story broke about the allegations of child molestation.  I remember sitting in my old-fashioned studio apartment in Los Feliz and watching the reports flash across the screen.  Because entertainment is "The Industry" in LA, anything remotely entertainment related came first, news-wise.   I was also much too poor to afford cable, and so I was watching on regular old network television.  They actually interrupted regular programming to bring the news, though, and then, when Jackson made his statement, live from Neverland Ranch, they carried the before, during and after.  I remember being simultaneously awestruck by Michael Jackson's ability to command such attention and the amazed that the local nets thought this was important enough to do away with everything else that was going on.  

I remember watching all of it, eating it up with the prurient curiosity that fuels all of our celebrity obsession here in America, and shaking my head in wonder.  It was a crazy moment.  I wasn't ever one of the girls who was crushing on Michael Jackson, or in love with him.  I did, however, love his music.  

I can remember being a kid and dancing around to "ABC".  I can remember being in New York, en route to some family gathering and "Dancing Machine"  coming on the radio, and begging whoever was at the wheel to turn it up.  I remember the Jacksons on Soul Train, singing "Dancing Machine", as well-- Michael does the robot at the bridge and lights up the stage.  I remember moving to DC and my aunt's then brother-in-law brought "Off the Wall" to our house.  I remember hearing "Workin' Day & Night" and "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough" and thinking, why would anyone listen to "Rock With You" or do "The Rock", which was The Dance of the moment, when they could dance to the soul-searing, infectiously uptempo "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough"?!  I was eight at the time, and really big on Soul Train. I would dance around the brick-floored back room of our house on Capitol Hill, screaming, "OOOOOOHHH!" at the top of my lungs.  

I remember looking at the cover of the album and thinking, "something's a little off about his face."  And my mother explained to me that he'd had his nose done.  I remember being perplexed, and wondering why on earth he would do something that was so obviously not natural to his face.  I also remember thinking that his "before" nose looked an awful lot like mine.  

Cut to sixth grade-- Thriller!  I remember when it came out, and I remember seeing the video for Billy Jean on one of our local video shows (yeah, DC didn't get cable in the inner city til my senior year of high school).  I liked it, to say the least.  But I also remember thinking wow, that's a helluva jheri curl you're rocking, Mike.  And that the nose job was even more pronounced.  I got my copy, just like all my peers, played the songs endlessly like all my peers, loved, loved, loved the album.  I used to love PYT;  Human Nature remains an all time fave.  I had the poster of  Michael in yellow and white, looking fairly normal. I didn't like any of the others that my friends had-- he just always looked too something for me.  

The jheri curl, the makeup, the clothing which I found odd.  I didn't like iconic glove that everyone else loved; I didn't get the super short pants.  But I did get the dancing ability and sheer showmanship of Michael Jackson.  My mother and I watched the Motown 25: Yesterday, Today and Forever special, mostly because she was eager to reminisce and groove to the music of her generation.  We both watched, open-mouthed, as Michael moonwalked into history.  And because I'd managed to rig the betamax to tape it, I watched it again, and again, and again.  

So many of the pieces written about him in the past week have quickly veered into the negative-- what about the molestation charges?  His penchant for plastic surgery?  His family?  The kids?  The marriages?  Next we were goaded into an official "black" response.  Next... this business about Michael Jackson transcending race, gender, sexuality.

I get that the last is meant as a compliment and I have really struggled, over the entirety of his very long public life -- I mean his career is older than I am-- with the changes and the oddness and the WTF?! element.  But I would also argue that rather than transcending, Michael was defining:  showmanship, entertainment, sheer amazing-ness.  It was very, very clear to me that he was locked into some kind of crazy view of himself, one that drove him to rip apart the beautiful face that he was born with and reinvent it into the oddity that looked like a Guy Fawkes mask in a funhouse.  But even with that... that definition of entertainment was always, always there.  Even when he was looking a little wacky and out of it (um, the VMA's where he thought they were giving him Entertainer of the Millenium or something, springs to mind), you still wanted to hear him let out an "oooooh!" and pop a few moves out.  

During my second stint in LA, the second set of allegations surfaced, and MJ went to trial.  I remember watching him trundling to court in pajamas; the day he broke out in dance on top of a car; the fans who faithfully crowded the courthouse.  I remember reading the Vanity Fair pieces about the trial and all of the Los Angeles news coverage, which seemed endless.  It was a madhouse.  It seemed like the music stopped, then.  I know he released more albums after Bad, but I think that was the last one I bought without reservation.  It was the last one I listened to with expectation.  I told myself it was because I was always really a Prince fan... but it was also the freakshow element.

It's complicated-- not for nuthin' did Gen-Xers practically invent this relationship status.  I love the music, the dance, the show, the definition of Ultimate Pop Star.  Unlike the pretenders to the throne *cough* Bobby Brown *cough*; I would never dispute MJ as King of Pop. There's no crossover. Michael made a market:  kids who would grow up to buy his stuff again and again; he brought a whole new audience (from around the world) to MTV again and again; he defined success by selling 25 million copies of Thriller.  But it's complicated because I do feel bad that that beautiful little brown sugar baby who could dance like James Brown at the age of five and had a smile that lit up a room never saw how his face the same way we did.  The teenager who really never seemed all that awkward and gawky, thanks to his fluid dance moves, didn't look in the mirror and find anything to love.  The grown up who literally caused women and men to cry and throw themselves at his feet never embraced himself as he was... 

I almost forgot about this-- the movie, Three Kings, says a lot of what I think about evolution of Michael Jackson.  Remember the torture scene?  The guy is torturing Mark Wahlberg and says, "say my man-- what did you do to Michael Jackson?!"  and proceeds to equate evil of America with the demise of Michael Jackson's nose and skin color.  I remember watching that scene with the same shock and awe as I did Michael's maiden moonwalk.  It perfectly encapsulated a lot of what I have felt as a minority growing up in a country where the dominant culture says that thin, blonde, blue-eyed and pert of nose are the only ways to be.  I used to not so jokingly add to the chorus of "Black or White"-- "if you wanna be my baby it don't matter if you're black or white... as long as you're white!"  As creepy as his face became, as sad as his life seemed to be at points, I could sympathize. I'm a civilian, with no desire to be a bajillion selling artist.  I know what it feels like to look in the mirror and think that you don't look like "the ideal".  I always found it sad, though, that he could be a bajillion selling artist, revered as the greatest... and still not love himself.  

I respect his legacy, and I have thoroughly enjoyed reliving all of the moments that wowed us all.  But I also feel so sad for him, and hope that he's genuinely resting in peace.