Goodbye MJ-reflecting on my first intro

I’m still finding it hard to process the fact that Michael Jackson has departed from this world.  This reality fuels a series of fires for me, one in particular is the nostalgia for the moment I lost my musical virginity.

‘Bad’ was the first music video I ever saw as a kid and the first window into pop culture.

Since my family was very religious and conservative at the time, I’d never heard secular music let alone SEEN a rock star(we didn’t have a TV at the time either).  

It was a saturday evening following a day at church and the usual lunch afterwards at my parent’s friends house…discussions about the sermon, prayer and reflections and musings on the bible etc,.. (to be fair there was always lots of humor at least).  These friends of my parents had a couple sons who were quite a bit older than me and as a result removed themselves from much of the banter and spent most of the afternoons doing their own thing and the minute the sun would set, the TV would go on(the religion didn’t allow tv from friday sundown to saturday sundown).I happened to be walking past the room where they were hanging out on this one memorable evening and just at that moment, ‘Bad’ came onto MTV.  I stood there watching in complete disbelief.  I remember the feeling so vividly.  ”Was this a real human? What was he wearing? Was he the devil?”  Yes I even thought he may be the devil!  I mean it was the antithesis of any fluffy imagery I’d ever seen before in my life. But he was so smooooooth….despite the confusion something inside me felt strangely awakened!  I was too young to know what to do with that feeling but nevertheless it opened the door to reality.  Well….the kind of reality where i wanted to be.Today I don’t know what it’s like to feel that.  I haven’t seen or heard anything since that has remotely had an impact on me like that.  Yes it was intensified by the fact that my squeaky clean existence had never experienced such a jolt, but more than that, there was a sort of primal mystery that cast it’s spell over me like never before and never since.  The reason?  Well, clearly because he’s a god!  Otherworldly and undefinable. Past mere mortal comprehension yet grasping, transfixing and thrilling the simplest of minds effortlessly.  POP at it’s purest and most magnificent.
Thank you MJ for blowing my mind.

I bought a picture vinyl of ‘Bad’ last year.