I was not a happy child, but many of the scattered happy moments that I remember of my younger days had some random MJ track playing in the background, and that's why I feel like a distant relative has died.
My father died when I was four years old and one of the few truly personal things he left behind was his music collection. Michael Jackson alone was almost 40% of that collection. I have very few concrete memories of Dad, but what I do know is that he loved music, and he loved MJ, and knowing that he and I have the same taste in music makes me feel like a part of him lives on in me. As in my dad LOVED Michael Jackson.
The Thriller LP still gets occassional playing in my house. We watched the moonwalker video on many public holidays as a family until some random neighbour purloined it and it was never seen again. My siblings and I fought like a nonesense as kids but on one thing the verdict was unanimous - MJ was the greatest. I wore white socks outside school because Michael did it. I remember practicing the forward tilt from Smooth Criminal over and over again and wondering why I could never get it right . I wanted a single white glove (and let's face it, I still do). I still pull out a moonwalk in the club from time to time, and I don't even have to be particularly drunk to do it. We are the world, despite all the cynicism about the US and aid and all that shit, still brings tears to my eyes. I can't even count the number of dances I choreographed to PYT, Liberian girl, Leave me alone, Bad, Don't stop till you get enough and my all time favourite dance number - The way you make me feel. And don't even get me started on the zombie sequence from Thriller. I don't know all my first cousin's names, but I can lipsynch most of MJ's songs word for word for word.
As one who is not particularly prone to random expressions of emotions, I am really and truly gutted at this death. Listen, I may be ridiculously selective about the things that I allow myself to care about, but when I love something, I love it. Completely. And I loved MJ's music.
I feel like a part of my life has died with him. Like that song of his, Have you seen my Childhood, I'm wondering if this is yet another signal that that phase of my life is over. MJ was a performer and I wanted to be a performer, so while many other people my age at that time wanted to be businessmen and the like, I wanted to be Michael Jackson. Of course he had a troubled personal life, it would be hypocritical to pretend that none of that mattered. But the music...oh, man the music. The PERFORMANCE. The sheer artistry of it all. Each and every single detail of the videos and the stage performances planned to perfection. And the boy could sing! Good golly, the boy could sing!(Check out any of his live performances on you tube if you don't believe me).
As in any other place in the world, in Nairobi the rich kids had money and the pretty kids had attention. The cool kids played sports and the dorks buried their heads in the books. And the rest of us, who didn't quite fit any of the categories or labels placed on us - the skinny kids with the big glasses and the funny hair and the funny clothes, little kids with big personalities that never quite fitted what we looked like on the outside - we had MJ.
Thank you for the music, Michael. Rest in peace. |
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