Wow. How startling, right? But maybe for the best in some higher spiritual realm. Who knows. But the guy was seriously whacky; living full-time in out-to-lunch-ville.

My favorite record of his was, of course, Thriller. I still love that album and it has so many incredibly good memories for me of life in the East Village in NYC in the 80s. Nothing spectacular, just life-memories; the day to day stuff when I was sometimes happy, sometimes despairing, but at all times completely out of my fucking mind! Yay.

Hanging out in the laundromat on the corner of Avenue A and E. 13th Street in the god-awful New York heat, watching the dryer going around and around and listening to Billie Jean on the radio -- one of my all-time favorite songs still. In the days when people like Allen Ginsberg or Matt Dillon would just be walking down the street and you could sit in the laundromat and see it all. Then go home to your little hell-hole-tenement walk-up on E. 12th Street and listen to Billie Jean again on your boombox.

Last night, I was driving home fom mom's, trying to beat a thunderstorm. The skies were really, really bad and we live in tornado country out here. So I turned on the radio to see if there were any emergency weather bulletins or anything, and out comes Michael Jackson's rendition of  Rockin' Robin from when I was 11 years old. I loved that song; I would listen to the 45 single of it over & over on my little portable record player; my bedroom completely dark, the volume on the record turned way down because I was supposed to be in bed going to sleep. I hadn't heard the song in ages. I sang along to it last night and still new every single word, down to all the tweetly-dees. But when the song was over, I turned off the radio because I abhor commercials. I absolutely cannot stand them -- on the radio or the TV. Well, I don't even have TV anymore since all I do is watch movies. But anyway...

I was remembering being a little girl and how much I used to love Michael Jackson. I had his early solo albums, too (i.e., Ben and the other one that I can't remember the name of), and I played them relentlessly, etc., etc. And as I was pulling into my driveway, I was wondering what the fuck really happened to that guy? I think we all know. I mean, intense fame & wealth, no childhood, overbearing crazy dad, and all that. But still, what the fuck happened?

I came inside as the thunderstorms really hit -- lightning all over the sky; cracking and booming and torrential downpours. And there on my computer, as I was hurrying to shut it down because of the electrical storm, was the unusual answer to my question: he fucking died, that's what fucking happened. I couldn't believe it.

And of course I went to bed thinking how incredibly strange it was that Michael Jackson and Farah Fawcett should die on the very same day. I wondered if they'd made some sort of secret spiritual 70s-icon pact to meet in the afterlife or something. You never really know when it comes to the spirit world, do you? (It was sort of like losing Hunter S. Thompson and Sandra Dee on the same day a few years ago; for me, it was just too devastating. I loved both of them for obviously very different reasons. But still. How strangely, strangely bizarre. It really killed me when I learned that Hunter had killed himself. I was grieving, you know? But then later in the morning that weird news that Sandra Dee was dead, too. And it sort of blows your grief right out of the water; they couldn't have been more opposite from each other if they'd tried and it made each of their deaths seem sort of ridiculous. Yet... You can't help but wonder if they had some kind of weird spritiual destiny to leave this realm together.)

It makes me think of one of my favorite Tom Waits' songs from Rain Dogs, "they all went to heaven in a little row boat; clap hands..."

Well, anyway, good-bye, Michael. Thanks for Thriller, at any rate.