My This Is It movie ticket is already in my wallet, awaiting the Tuesday, October 27 at 9pm (Pacific Time) premiere. I will be wearing a Michael Jackson t-shirt and sparkly glove that night.
When I was little, I remember my mother liking Michael Jackson and being excited about his song/video tied into Free Willy. I decided I also liked the song, video, and performer around that time. Yeah, mom was onto something with this guy.
That was in 1993. I have liked Michael Jackson for 16 years. It's more impressive when you realize that I was not quite six years old yet when Free Willy came out. That's sixteen years of my twenty-two years of life.
When I was sixteen, my little sister and I did a duet jazz dance class together. On Day 1, we said we wanted our recital piece to be to "Beat It," and we wanted to use hats. We practiced at home using our mother's old cassette tape. Not long after that, I decided I needed "real CDs" (I only had a handful of albums then, mainly Backstreet Boys and such). My first purchase: Michael Jackson Number Ones, and I believe the Numbers Ones music videos DVD was actually a gift from my mommy.
Mother and I were hardcore TEAM MICHAEL during the 2005 trial, and jumped around with each announcement of "not guilty." I looked at the cost of airfare to go to London for the O2 shows (mother said that was too unlikely). Then I was outside UCLA hospital an hour after he was pronounced dead. It's weird that that is as close as I could ever be to him.
So yeah. Sixteen years. 72% of my lifetime.
