In nearly every home movie that documents my childhood, you will see footage of me trying my hardest to mimic the dance moves of Michael Jackson. At every family gathering, Christmas parties especially, you would find the four-year-old version of me doing the moonwalk to the laughter and applause of my aunts and uncles. Who didn’t imitate the King of Pop when they were kids? I will never forget asking my parents to play and replay my VHS of Moonwalker and rewinding the scene in the myserious prohibition-era nightclub when Michael performs Smooth Criminal . The scene simply defined “cool.”
With Michael dies part of the childhood of many in my generation. He was up there with The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Michael Keaton’s Batman, and the Simpsons when it was still good. And he undoubtedly went beyond that with his unprecedented talent and amazing showmanship. What we knew and associated with Michael when we were growing up made his bizzare lifestyle and charges of molestation so difficult to accept. His death is tragic because of how we remembered him when we were young and how others remembered him in recent years. However one remembers Michael Jackson, may his reign as the King of Pop never be forgotten.
