I needed to say something, write something down. This would be something my grandkids would ask about, that I might not remember accurately, given that my goal is to be like that wine-soaked grandmother from Spanglish.
Michael Jackson died. I’m still kind of fascinated and sad about it. I don’t feel like most of the people around me were really affected, but [story of my life] I tend to feel things 23048234 times more deeply than others. Don’t let your inner monologue read that in a tone that suggests privilege. Being entirely too sensitive is, for the most part, a plague, derailing my life for days while everyone else is like, “Um, get over it already?”
I heard the news when Bess took me as her +1 to a preview event of the King Tut Exhibit at the Children’s Museum. I was in complete disbelief and denial, of course, reacting with my usual response to anything that makes me emotionally uncomfortable - cracking jokes and trying to remain distracted. Also, you know I cashed in my drink tickets. On an empty stomach. On a week when I kept forgetting, then remembering, to take my medication, which meant two glasses of wine felt like I chugged the whole bottle and then proceeded to smoke some chronic. [HI GRANDKIDS!] My point being that I felt so fuzzy, the whole shabang felt out-of-body, a sensation heightened by dark, cool museum rooms and majestic marble pharaohs and shiny golden Tut trinkets and Harrison Ford narrating the audio guide. I feel weird, Michael Jackson died, oh look, there’s King Tut’s stomach urn.
Driving back home, east on I-70, I flipped through my radio presets, every station playing Michael Jackson — even if it was completely off format. One of my professors pointed out this detail when remembering the day John Lennon died. No matter how I tried to shrug it off, I could already feel it becoming a big deal to me, could feel it swell as I tried to wrap my mind around the fact that Michael Jackson had died.
I haven’t shed any tears over the matter, and I know that only means one thing: it will hit me tomorrow afternoon, during the memorial, when I will start sobbing uncontrollably behind the walls of my office. I’m sure whatever takes place tomorrow will provide some closure, so I thought I’d come here and spew my memories in black and white before then. There are a bunch of them. Snapshots of the daily minutiae of my past that may do nothing for you but help explain why, despite twelve days of non-stop news coverage, I’m still talking about it.
