The King Is Dead. A Moment of Silence, Please.

It comes in threes, and unfortunately Michael Jackson has completed that awful trinity. Michael Jackson. One of the few people out there I'd thought of as being immortal. Despite a series of health issues, he always seemed to hang in there.
I'd been asleep, as I'm known to do most of the time, and received a text with the news. In a sleepy haze, I shook my head and wrote it off as some kind of hoax. In my mind, a loving God wouldn't take him before, say, Paris Hilton, Britney Spears, or [insert typical Hollywood bimbo]. His personal life was questionable, no doubt. Everyone knows about the child molestation charges, hanging Blanket off the balcony, going out in public looking as though he was afraid SARS was going to make a comeback before he did, the overly excessive plastic surgery that transformed him from a handsome African-American man to...something not even human, etc. But he was human. A fragile human, at that.
I'll be one of the first to admit that I made many jokes about him concerning this behavior, as most of us did. I found the South Park episode about him to be both hilarious and frightening. I never did it for malicious purposes. I, like South Park, make fun of everything.
I actually respected the guy, and pitied him. The respect has been there since I was a child. I was sitting here earlier, listening to his music and fully realizing how it had an impact on me then. I remember being four or five, trying so hard to Moonwalk. Once I thought I had it right, I'd try to show people and just trip over myself and fall over. Michael was the coolest for that. He was probably my second favorite Michael overall (gimme a break, it was the 90's and I had the Jordan fever. Basketball was life for a certain redheaded tomboy!)
I loved the sound of his voice. It was so unique and still is. Next to aspiring NBA (yes, you read that right) player, I wanted to be a singer. Now singing is my number one aspiration. After several failed attempts at dancing (that have carried over to adulthood), I spent a long time trying to imitate him and those weird inflections that sounded like a cross between a sob and a hiccup. I didn't know what the hell he was doing, but I liked it. I ended up sounding like a dying cat, so I tried to sound like Whitney Houston instead. Let's face it, I shouldn't really be white. The Whitney Houston thing also failed, but I digress.
The first tears that threatened to spill over tonight came from "Will You Be There." It was basically the theme from Free Willy. Yeah, that whale movie. Being a lover of animals and such, it was one of those movies that really affected me emotionally. The song did too. Just thinking about that damn song and movie make me tear up.
Losing Michael is the end of an era. Many people will probably feel like others did when we lost Elvis, Jimi Hendrix, John Lennon, Kurt Cobain, Tupac, etc. Mr. Jackson was a very talented and kind-hearted individual, despite the allegations against him. He will be missed dearly.
He obviously had a lot of issues in his short life, and maybe I'm not being as harsh on him as others would be. The man was really like a child in a grown man's body, and I find it sad that he had to be like that in the first place. Hopefully now he is at peace. <3 For now we should focus on the musical legacy he left behind.