When Michael Jackson died, a lot of people felt a great deal of pain and loss, but, with no disrespect, I was not one of them. Though I thought the tunes on the early 80's albums had some great beats, and the videos were a lot of fun, I never felt truly excited about any of it, and to this day, the only stuff of his that really rings in my heart is the early Jackson Five songbook: "I Want You Back", "ABC"....you get the picture.
Plus there was the whole matter of his very public and visible mental illness, over so many years. Even people who were heartbroken over his death weren't what you'd call surprised.
Nevertheless, when Michael died, there was a tremendous outpouring of reflections on what he and his music meant to people. And though I was not among the bereaved, I could at least understand it on some level.
What began to irritate me, though, beyond the ghoulish death cult aspect - which, to be fair, ain't exactly a new phenomenon - was the outlandish hyperbole of some of the praise, statements like, "he was the greatest singer and dancer who ever lived."
Really? My initial good will began to grow thin.
Then a memory came to me - and like many of the more compelling ones, it rose up from the deeps without warning; clear, detailed, and solid as a swinging fist:
December, 1980. Typical Bay Area winter; not too cold after the morning haze burned away, most days; I was living with the woman I loved, who would be my wife in a couple more years; we were both working steady and money wasn't too tight, so we could keep our car running, and even hit a movie or a decent restaurant when we liked. A lot to be thankful for.
But the band I'd been in for a couple of years - and had grown really fond of - had moved away, and in fact most of my gang of musical brethren had left the area. With help, I would eventually put new musical projects together, but at that point, I felt a great hole in my life, and at times I felt just like a ghost.
Tom Dunn, my long-time friend and the bassist for my now ex-band had taught me how to strip, rebuild, and refinish old oak chairs and benches, and we'd had a decent little piecework business that we'd been operating out of the ground floor of a decrepit rental property owned by the dealer whose furniture we were working on. It was a good two-person process; one of us would strip the old varnish or paint off the chairs while the other would clean the solvents off the ones we'd already stripped, knock apart the pieces that were loose, then glue and clamp them; then we'd unclamp them, sand them, varnish them, and drive them up to the dealer's showroom, collect our pay, and pick up the next batch of work.
But Tom had moved away, and the job was much slower - and lonelier - as a one-man gig.
Pretty much every day, I would break for lunch, walk to the McDonald's on Telegraph and 45th, buy an afternoon paper from the machine out front, order a fish filet sandwich, fries, and Diet Coke, sit by myself at a plastic table in my paint-solvent-sawdust-encrusted work clothes, eat, read, dispose of my trash, then return to work till it got too cold or dark to keep going.
The day after John Lennon was murdered, I had spent the morning trying to work, but with the radio playing his music all day, I was mostly just trying to not cry too much, and trying to remember not to rub my eyes with all the crap I had on my hands.
Lunchtime came, and, mostly out of pure routine, I trudged over to McDonald's and had my usual. But of course, the newspaper was full of news about the killing, and despite being surrounded by total strangers - most of whom were black teenagers who probably didn't know John Lennon from a hole in the wall - I cried quietly but continuously throughout my meal. I could tell my fellow diners looking at me like I was a lunatic but I didn't care very much. I threw away most of my meal and went back to work, at least for a little while.
Thinking back on all this, I realized, you pompous prick, who cares how over-rated you think Michael Jackson was? People's hearts are broken, and maybe not even mostly about the death of a pop singer. You don't know. Hell, THEY don't know. So would it kill you to have some kindness in your heart for them?
I suspect a lot depends on this.
Plus there was the whole matter of his very public and visible mental illness, over so many years. Even people who were heartbroken over his death weren't what you'd call surprised.
Nevertheless, when Michael died, there was a tremendous outpouring of reflections on what he and his music meant to people. And though I was not among the bereaved, I could at least understand it on some level.
What began to irritate me, though, beyond the ghoulish death cult aspect - which, to be fair, ain't exactly a new phenomenon - was the outlandish hyperbole of some of the praise, statements like, "he was the greatest singer and dancer who ever lived."
Really? My initial good will began to grow thin.
Then a memory came to me - and like many of the more compelling ones, it rose up from the deeps without warning; clear, detailed, and solid as a swinging fist:
December, 1980. Typical Bay Area winter; not too cold after the morning haze burned away, most days; I was living with the woman I loved, who would be my wife in a couple more years; we were both working steady and money wasn't too tight, so we could keep our car running, and even hit a movie or a decent restaurant when we liked. A lot to be thankful for.
But the band I'd been in for a couple of years - and had grown really fond of - had moved away, and in fact most of my gang of musical brethren had left the area. With help, I would eventually put new musical projects together, but at that point, I felt a great hole in my life, and at times I felt just like a ghost.
Tom Dunn, my long-time friend and the bassist for my now ex-band had taught me how to strip, rebuild, and refinish old oak chairs and benches, and we'd had a decent little piecework business that we'd been operating out of the ground floor of a decrepit rental property owned by the dealer whose furniture we were working on. It was a good two-person process; one of us would strip the old varnish or paint off the chairs while the other would clean the solvents off the ones we'd already stripped, knock apart the pieces that were loose, then glue and clamp them; then we'd unclamp them, sand them, varnish them, and drive them up to the dealer's showroom, collect our pay, and pick up the next batch of work.
But Tom had moved away, and the job was much slower - and lonelier - as a one-man gig.
Pretty much every day, I would break for lunch, walk to the McDonald's on Telegraph and 45th, buy an afternoon paper from the machine out front, order a fish filet sandwich, fries, and Diet Coke, sit by myself at a plastic table in my paint-solvent-sawdust-encrusted work clothes, eat, read, dispose of my trash, then return to work till it got too cold or dark to keep going.
The day after John Lennon was murdered, I had spent the morning trying to work, but with the radio playing his music all day, I was mostly just trying to not cry too much, and trying to remember not to rub my eyes with all the crap I had on my hands.
Lunchtime came, and, mostly out of pure routine, I trudged over to McDonald's and had my usual. But of course, the newspaper was full of news about the killing, and despite being surrounded by total strangers - most of whom were black teenagers who probably didn't know John Lennon from a hole in the wall - I cried quietly but continuously throughout my meal. I could tell my fellow diners looking at me like I was a lunatic but I didn't care very much. I threw away most of my meal and went back to work, at least for a little while.
Thinking back on all this, I realized, you pompous prick, who cares how over-rated you think Michael Jackson was? People's hearts are broken, and maybe not even mostly about the death of a pop singer. You don't know. Hell, THEY don't know. So would it kill you to have some kindness in your heart for them?
I suspect a lot depends on this.
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