The other night, I was on my Facebook page. I pasted in a video clip of Michael Jackson, singing a beautiful rendition of “I’ll Be There” when he was a child. It made me feel better to watch him sing, to listen to the innocence of his beautiful boy soprano. I felt the need to reconnect with others who were blown away by news of his death. One person quickly responded to my Facebook post, and it shouldn’t have surprised me. It was my sister.
My sister and I grew up on the Jackson 5, the Partridge Family and the Osmonds. Heck, all the kids loved those groups. But the Jackson 5 were special. We both loved the Jackson 5’s dancing, and I especially loved “I’ll Be There.” Years later, we rediscovered Michael with “Off the Wall,” and then with “Thriller.” As a young adult, my sister was a true Jackson fan, living for his singing and dancing. One of my greatest memories of him was “We are the World,” watching him and Quincy Jones and Lionel Richie and many others make a great difference to Africa.
I know, these are all sort of glorified memories. We all know he got progressively stranger the last decade or so. His skin got lighter. His makeup stranger. He dangled babies from balconies. He went to court for abuse. He withdrew from the world and became a sort of Howard Hughes pop star.
Then why does it hurt so much to have him die at 50?
I think it is because Michael Jackson is a peer. I think of him and I remember myself in the ’70s. While he sang “ABC” I was playing softball, or having slumber parties. When he sang “Billie Jean,” my sister and I were building our independence and getting ready to leave home. When he moved to “Thriller” we were off at college and exploring the world. All of the decades of my life, Michael Jackson was a presence. He was a force. No one could do the moonwalk like him, or the robot, or anything else. We lived to see him dance and sing.
I know he got stranger and stranger, but I just keep remembering that other guy. The guy who was cute and talented and who raised a generation. I compare it to Mel Gibson. Do we have to hear anything else about how strange he has become in the last several years? But to me he is still the gorgeous guy in “The Year of Living Dangerously” or the scary guy in “Road Warrior.” I don’t want to think about Mel making racist comments or getting drunk and yelling at cops. Because if Mel is annoying and old and tacky, what about me?
I have felt moved by the Michael Jackson story. I keep coming back to the computer and the TV, watching tributes, listening to his music. My children roll their eyes as I pull them to the computer one last time to watch a clip of Michael moonwalking or singing. I want to see them discover him, as I did.
In June, my Camp Fire girls and I went camping at Camp Sealth. There was a talent show, and every group was asked to come up with a dance for the other kids at camp. My kids learned the dance from Thriller and wore strange costumes to look like zombies. The dance was a hit. The girls loved it, and won a prize. As I sat in the crowd and watched them, I fought tears. They were tears for a Camp Fire group ending, for a group of girls coming into their own, and for such an amazing ride the girls have taken. I didn’t know there were going to turn out to be tears for Michael Jackson.
Hey, Michael, I choose to remember the old you, the guy who made us smile, who was part of every decade of my life. That is the you I teach my kids about. And I love to watch them as they catch on to what made you so special. I am sorry that your life became what it became. Maybe no one is meant to be as famous as you were. Maybe it is impossible to handle it, to stay “normal” in the face of all of that attention. Maybe none of us really knew who you were.
But we can decide how to remember you. I choose to remember a boy soprano, singing “I’ll be There” on my turntable in the ’70s. Time has flown. But you were everything to us. I hope you knew it.
— Lauri Hennessey runs a public relations business. She can be reached at lauri@hennesseypr.com.
