RIP Michael Jackson...

I think that John Mayer, my cohort, summed it up best when he twittered, "I think we'll mourn his loss as well as the loss of ourselves as children listening to Thriller on the record player." I remember listening to Thriller on a record player when my family lived a block from Tower Grove Park on Lackland. My sister had a poster of Michael on the wall and she may have also had the crystal-studded glove. Everyone wanted the zipper covered leather jacket and while it was out of reach for us, we were able to afford his albums. They were still albums then, at least for us, because we didn't own a cassette tape player. It's unfortunate that his reputation was marred with child-molestation accusations and other craziness involving buying the "Elephant Man's" skeleton. Thinking back on my childhood and even early teen years there were many of his songs that added to the soundtrack that is my life. Remember the theme song to "Free Willy" or the video "It's black, it's white." That video had cutting edge computer generated morphing images. Not only that but it also had Naomi Campbell (pre-crazy psycho throwing her cell phones at assistants) and Macaulay Culkin in it. I also remember when I was at my grandma's, who had cable at the time, and Thriller came on, I was told I couldn't watch it. I hid under the army green afghan and watched through the holes. I know that not everyone will, but I'm going to remember him for those good memories, and not the media-frenzy memories where they just wanted to knock him down. Goodbye, Michael.