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Mother of God. What does one say about Michael Jackson that a million other people on the internet will say with more considerable eloquence than I can?

Michael Jackson runs through my veins. Even when his music, particularly during the latter years, no longer touched me, he was always there. From my childhood watching the Jackson 5 cartoon on Saturday mornings. Cranked the soundtrack to The Wiz just for hear Michael's sublime voice. My gym teacher in junior high school used to play Off The Wall on a little toy record player while we did our jumping jacks, something I Pavolvianly still get the urge to do every time I hear "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough". I recorded the night he performed "Billie Jean" on the Motown 25th anniversary special, screaming almost as deliriously as the audience, and I had that very same VHS tape up until a mere 12 years ago when it broke in the VCR showing it to some friends. Thriller sat on every person I know's turntable, although I also had the singles to "Beat It" and "Billie Jean". I can still remember the day when the "Thriller" video debuted on MTV, how all my friends in my next door neighbor's living room (coincidentally the same house with the teenage boy who had that Farrah Fawcett poster in his room) screamed and cheered with hysteria watching Michael's face morph into a werewolf for the very first time.

I didn't really like the Bad album when it came out, already feeling like the Michael who is compelled to take on a tougher image after the speculations about his sexuality where rampant in the news. His once soulful voice twisted into macho growls and shrill shrieks, in way that forgo the natural vocal talent that he already had. In fact, I haven't heard a Michael Jackson song I liked post-Thriller since the lovely "Butterflies" off the Invincible album. Just because he sang on the record -- just sang -- probably for the first time in what felt like another lifetime.

Michael got strange. But then who potentially couldn't, having the life he had since childhood. A life without a childhood, crippled with insecurities, with the kind of wealth and fame that cannot be measured by previous standards. Surrounded by his select posse of yes-men who were probably paid not to tell him that he was going off the deep-end. And the issues with the children who stayed at Neverland Ranch? I don't know if I am in any position to really judge. I mean, I hope it was all innocent. But if we're able to accept Michael and all his face-morphing llama-riding, baby-dangling eccentricities, all childlike and innocent in their nature, could it be possible that he'd be capable of innocence in other aspects of his private life as well? I admit that's naive, but then again, in many ways, so was Michael.

In a way, Michael appeared to transcend mortality. Yet as the same time I never could picture Michael growing old and passing away of old age. Yet how does one pass away when you have achieved such a level of fame where, like Charlie Gordon in Flowers For Algernon, you can no longer relate to your fellow human beings, and ascend to a level of godlike stardom where humanity has no charted maps for what lies beyond. After all, it seems, Michael was human, just like the rest of us. No fanfare, no drama. No deathbed vigils or candlelight marches. He was here, and then he was gone. It's so... human. It's so staggering.

Michael Jackson was an integral part of the soundtrack to my life. I may reflect a lot more on his career throughout the week, as well as his music. Meanwhile, I'm going down to my store, which is playing his music all day long, and then listen to Off The Wall for the rest of the night.