Comeback By Death

My office building is just a block and a half from the Staples Center. Yesterday, there was concern about how many people would be swarming by the venue for the Memorial for Mr. Jackson, such that there had to be an "administrative advisory" that it was "business as usual" and everyone who did not have a pre-scheduled vacation was expected to be at his or her desk. Of course, a fair number of people called in sick today in response to the management remonstration.

As it turned out, Grand Avenue was clearer than usual as I came to work a bit earlier than usual, just in case. Hitting the corner of Olympic and Grand and turning my head a bit right, I could see the gathering mourners. Except, really, from the outside, which is how I tangentially observed the event, it looked less like mourning than a festival.

I say tangentially, because I never got that close. At lunchtime I decided that this was a good day for people watching in the afternoon sun and I ensconced myself at the outside patio of a newish Wine Bar (alas no wine for me; twas a parsley lemonade--you'd be surprised how refreshing) and consumed a most delicious burger with a side of au gratin potatoes. Up to the moment I showed up, the Wine Bar, Cork (which btw, I recommend highly) was empty. But as the people who had attended the show emptied the facility, they wended their way to parking lots in my area, carrying various licensed and unlicensed memorabilia, and I watched them to the sounds of Michael himself singing on a loop of CDs or MP3. There were at least three helicopters (they began yesterday, making work very difficult) low flying and circling, over and over.

The crowd was amazingly well the only word I have is an old one, for I am sure there is something far more hip--yuppie. Pretty well heeled folks who naturally win lotteries. The vendors hawked their sausages on the corner and the T-Shirts. Water bottles for a 1.00, cold and refreshing. I preferred my parsley lemonade, thank you. A couple sat next to me, and their copper holographic wrist bands announced they had been among the random chosen. I asked them how they liked it. Other than a "it was terrific" response, there was no further conversation or suggestion of its being wanted. They ordered and perused their souvenir booklet with shiny pictures of Michael in better, live days.

In a kind of sad contradiction, well, sad for Michael and not so sad for everyone who has lived and will for the future live off his legacy, he was as popular as he ever had been at the height of his career. No, more so. Legend status. Legend status with a reverence that he had not experienced when he was breathing for many a year, so much so that he had left the country for years. Today, he was Saint Michael, and the very press that had villified him for his relationships with children were now noting how doting a father he had been. What do they say when a royal dies.?"The King is dead. Long live the King!" Canonization at the Staples Center, after years of gleeful jokes about what must have been a tormented life without a single concern for those children that were brought out to maximize the sympathy, and perhaps not parenthetically, the bucks. AEG apparently is resisting contributing to the public coffers for all the police and security and blocked streets. They probably need to see how much they made before they can be generous to the little people whose taxes made the day possible. And what of Michael? He's made a comeback. Too bad he won't get to enjoy it. It wouldn't have lasted long. Somebody with a telephoto lens would have snapped something worthy of questions and attack.