I really wanna write about Michael Jackson. Less in tribute, though I'm burning a candle in my mind's eye as I type this, remembering four solid heartsick adolescent years devoted to love of him above all others. No, I'm thinking more about time. I wanna talk about time.
It's curious the way the sudden, shocking death of a cultural icon both stops time in a breathless moment and seems to stretch it out before us as if it were a film reel or timeline of our own lives. Every memorial image we see flashed across a flat screen or find ourselves rubbing from newsprint-stained fingertips might as well be one from our own narrative.
When I heard the news yesterday I pulled the needle off the record. Time stopped. I sensed instantly, as millions did, that it was the end of an era for me. If the day I told a doctor about my own family plans, the last night I held my grandmother's hand, the first time I set foot in a developing nation, or the last time I did something just for the money wasn't the exact moment I knew my childhood was over forever, Michael Jackson's death was. Pale yellow cardigan-clad Michael and his come-hither stare on the front of my Meade notebook, teary screams from the general admission seats at the Thriller concert and hours spent decifering the meaning of the Liberian Girl lyrics are no longer part of a living, breathing person. They are stopped dead in time.
But in the same breath, I am fascinated by the way time moves, by the passing of it. It's astounding that life moves fast enough that it can be encapsulated into a consumable hour-long visi-byte. That we can watch a person grow, morph, change and that all along, we are doing the same. It all went so quickly. I was ten when I first saw him. In parachute pants (me). I'm 33 now. As I watched the progression of Michael Jackson's life in images last night (all night), I was watching my own in my mind, with a similar sort of fascination. I'm not an icon. But I have spanned time.
It's curious the way the sudden, shocking death of a cultural icon both stops time in a breathless moment and seems to stretch it out before us as if it were a film reel or timeline of our own lives. Every memorial image we see flashed across a flat screen or find ourselves rubbing from newsprint-stained fingertips might as well be one from our own narrative.
When I heard the news yesterday I pulled the needle off the record. Time stopped. I sensed instantly, as millions did, that it was the end of an era for me. If the day I told a doctor about my own family plans, the last night I held my grandmother's hand, the first time I set foot in a developing nation, or the last time I did something just for the money wasn't the exact moment I knew my childhood was over forever, Michael Jackson's death was. Pale yellow cardigan-clad Michael and his come-hither stare on the front of my Meade notebook, teary screams from the general admission seats at the Thriller concert and hours spent decifering the meaning of the Liberian Girl lyrics are no longer part of a living, breathing person. They are stopped dead in time.
But in the same breath, I am fascinated by the way time moves, by the passing of it. It's astounding that life moves fast enough that it can be encapsulated into a consumable hour-long visi-byte. That we can watch a person grow, morph, change and that all along, we are doing the same. It all went so quickly. I was ten when I first saw him. In parachute pants (me). I'm 33 now. As I watched the progression of Michael Jackson's life in images last night (all night), I was watching my own in my mind, with a similar sort of fascination. I'm not an icon. But I have spanned time.
1 comment:
We have both spanned time, not only that, but we have spanned decades.
Fuck.
I miss the people who used to sing in my living room and make Thriller videos.
I miss believing we were going to be Icons, regardless of how happy I am now.
Post a Comment