Lauri Githens-Hatch says it's time to let Michael Jackson go

There comes a point after certain stunning losses where there really is nothing more to be said. 

Except, of course, what hasn't been said – because it's politically incorrect. Or unseemly. Or just plain awful-sounding. Or all three.

Even so, I loved him enough to know that this needs saying – and saying today of all days: Since June 25, not a day has gone by that I haven't thanked God for Michael Jackson's death – and with as much fervency as I ever thanked God for Jackson's life.

That's because we did not lose Jackson 12 days ago. We lost him decades ago, when Joseph Jackson began whipping, tripping, punching, shoving, pummeling, mocking and humiliating the seventh of his nine children into the incessant rehearsing and performing that made Michael a budding Motown star by age 10.

The hits Michael took to his body and his psyche should be as well-known as the hits that poured out of him and his brothers. They're not.

What people got was one dazzling song and dance move after another; what they never seemed to understand was that Jackson disappeared a little, and died a little, with every smash single and video he nailed to the charts and to our hearts. 

And he did it for 40 years.

That it is finally over is somehow is sweet and relieving to me as hearing "ABC" on the radio for the first time in years.

We're the generation that will pay the price for the privilege of enjoying the prime years of rock's most influential figures by having to bear witness to their passing.  And there are other horrible, gut-socking losses to come, and sooner rather than later: McCartney, Ringo, Townshend, Daltrey, Jagger, Richards, Clapton. But if none hurt quite as deeply or as painfully as this one, it may be because to remember Michael Jackson's life is to begin to fathom – with increasing amazement – how long Michael Jackson has been in ours. We've lost others with a hurt so intense it was transforming: Medgar. John. Martin. Bobby. Lennon. Diana. But many of us had to search our parents' faces for meaning when they died. They were among us, but not of us.

Michael was us – dreams, ambitions, dysfunctions and all. But he was also a once-in-a-lifetime experience we will never see again – and shouldn't want to.

Music we could not bear to live without. A life we could not bear to watch.

Moves that defied physics. And a heart that finally broke, breaking millions more in the process, mine included.  But I loved him enough, dysfunctions and all, to know both breaks were overdue.

In a few weeks, maybe less, things will seem the same.  I know the next time I'm out, for maybe the thousandth time we'll hear that thrilling piano glissando, that chunky guitar riff and bass, and then that unearthly voice like no other:  "Uh-hmmm-hmmmm... a-lemme tell ya' now, mmm-hmm...When I had ya' to myself, I didn't want you around...."  And then, for maybe the thousandth time, every person in the joint will be on the dance floor within seconds, singing along to Michael's timeless yearning.

Yet here's what won't be the same. I'll be singing this, just as I did at age 8, at age 18, at age 38:  "I wantchuback....oooh-ooh bay-bee...Iwantchuback..."

But for the first time, I'll be thinking this:  No, I don't.

And then I'll commit another first: dancing to the Jackson 5 while fighting back tears. Because I'll mean it. 

I don't want him back. It was time for Michael to let go – of the world he'd dazzled with footwork yet never provided him with a safe enough toehold.  And it was time for us to let go – of the funky brother already lost to us by the time we first heard him, but who we spent the next 40 years trying to get back even so.

I've loved him so long – enough to stop whatever I was doing as soon as I heard his voice, turn up the volume and dance myself into sweet funky oblivion – from the time I was little until I got old enough to despise the behaviors that accompanied that unearthly gift.

    

I've loved him so long – enough to cry tears of both devastation and gratitude.

I've loved him so long – enough to finally be able to break apart those five words, re-punctuate them and leave it, and him, at this.

I've loved him.

So long.

Enough.

-- Lauri Githens-Hatch

Comments

[Frank]

That same logic apply to Tim Russert?

[Janet Greenburg]

Time to let Michael Jackson go?
Then the same rules should apply to Elvis, Janis Joplin, James Brown, and other artist, fans can't seem to let go!

[Mark]

RIP, freak pedophile. I hope you burn in hell. I have no pity, no remorse for this freak of nature.

[Suzanne]

I loved his music in the early'80s. I thought he was beautiful. I felt sad for him as he whittled himself down to a bizarre caricature circa 1988 and going forward.
I think he did bring a lot of suffering on himself by his odd behavior including but not limited to his associations with children, which I think was inappropriate but not sexual.
Anyway, I think it is time to let this poor tortured soul rest in peace.

[Dan]

Ok, Lauri, it will be enough now because YOU say so.

[Ari]

Who are you to say when grief should end? I promise you that his family, friends, and fans cant just "let it go."

Oh, and for Mark and that terrible comment. Eff you.

[Bored]

Never a fan, but at least he shielded his kids from the spotlight...and the first thing the vultures did after he's gone is parade his poor kids in front of the cameras and onstage.

Ghouls!

[Your son James]

Hi Mommy

I Love You This Much

________________________________

[Lloyd Marshall, Jr.]

I may not agree with Mark's tone, but he does bring two facts to light...

1: MJ openly admitted in an interview that he held sleepovers in his room, and kids often slept in hhis bed... with him in it also.

2: Before the 2005 court case in which he was acquitted, a similar claim in 1993 saw him pay $20 MILLION to have it go away. Years later, the boy and his parents(who sued MJ) admitted they lied.

But STILL, the facts that he paid money and that he openly admitted his behaviors should tell us that something was, and will remain, amiss about him.

He was acquitted... SO WHAT?? His reputation, his integrity, his character... are all besmirched.

If any of us normal schlepps paid off "hush money" to have claims of this type go away, would that not call our character into question? Think about it.

[Libby56]

Medgar?

[lgithens]

RE: Libby56: "Medgar?" (July 16, 2009, 08:43 a.m.)

Oh, dear God, woman.

SEE: http://www.naacp.org/about/history/megarevers/index.htm

OR: http://topics.nytimes.com/topics/reference/timestopics/people/e/medgar_evers/index.html

Meanwhile, at the risk of triggering arrhythmia in you, Lib: You know the Beatles broke up, right?

[Paul]

Githens, you fit right in with this paper...Kunz Lite.