"michael jackson is dead and i don't feel so good myself"

like most of the world, i watched the "play by play" unfold of michael jackson's death today on fox news.

i have had my own thoughts and feelings about the self professed "king of pop" and was leaning in the direction of him being about as innocent as o.j.

i was listening to greta van susteren and shepard smith as they danced around the issue of telling the world that he was dead but needed more credible information. they were talking about his life and the more they showed of his life, it started to look more like a freak parade. over the span of his life, incidents involving him would come and go and over time, we forget a lot of things. seeing his life in a 15 minute capsule make me really see this was one weird, strange guy. as in the movie "trading places", was he a product of heredity or environment? he was 5'11" tall and weighed 120lbs. he had no childhood. he became famous practically as a toddler and was in the limelight and he was quoted as saying he never felt loved.

my personal thoughts aside, one statement came out that really hit me hard. one of the countless people who "knew him well" was with him at some show in australia. as usual, he had kids all around him and this person asked him about the kids and made the comment to him about what people said about him and children and why they were always around him. this guy said he remembered michael jackson looking him squarely in the eyes and said, "because they are the only ones who tell me the truth".

you can't argue the fact that he was extremely talented. he was perhaps the greatest showman we will see in our lifetime. he sold something like 750 million albums and is not only in the rock and roll hall of fame, he is in there twice. it was said he was close to being, if not, a billionaire (his debts were almost that much as well).
but, what we remember more than anything else, his personal life was like the proverbial "bus full of nuns rolling off a cliff". a horrible tragedy.

"Because they are they only ones who tell me the truth" was perhaps the saddest statement i have ever heard in my life. of all the people he had around him, whom he called friends, his family, etc, people used him for their own gain and told him what they thought he wanted to hear at the time, well, you get the picture. but as usual, i found a life lesson there. i wonder, if people look at me or think about me and my relationship with them, could they think the same of me? how many people in my life could i say the same about?

i know a lot of people. i have met a lot of people in my lifetime, probably tens of thousands over my 52 years. is there anybody out there that i have a solid enough relationship with that could say i am the only one who would tell them the truth? unfortunately there is not. equally sad is i can't say the same about anyone else.

tomorrow is a new day and i now have this thought to carry forward with me. it is something i now see i must work on and it will be painful at times but the end result will be worth it.

rest in peace michael. God knows you did not find it here.

until next time...