Letter

Dear Michael,

I've been sitting watching your videos, listening to your songs, reading bits and pieces of your life...

Had I known you even a little bit, I would likely have played big sister to you and screamed when you got your skin changed. I'd have told you not to be stupid. Because your smile was genuine when your skin was dark. As was your sadness. You were far more poignant sitting in a blue sweater singing 'She's Out of My Life'than going 'You Are Not Alone' with droopy hair.

I'm sorry, I'm being mean. I don't speak ill of musicians usually, and certainly not dead ones. But then that's what I like about you, Mikey. That you wear silver jumpsuits and sparkling socks and yet...people on the road, when they're arguing sometimes say, 'ei, apne aap ko Michael Jackson samajhta hai kya??' And they would all know exactly who they were talking about. Nobody says, 'ei, apne aap ko Jim Morrison samajhta hai kya?'

You want to know a secret Mikey? Eh? When I was about seven years old, I thought the epitome of success was to be able to walk like you did in Billy Jean. You know, with the jacket slung over your shoulder and one hand in your pocket. I fell in love with Slash at age six, but playing the guitar with a cigarette peeking through your hair just isn't attainable. You always seen much more within reach.

I won't talk about skin and lawsuits and loneliness - what could I say that you haven't lived through countless times...

I've been writing to you entirely in the present tense, have you realised? I'm not sure why, it just seems more feasible, more direct. Or maybe it's that your videos are playing even as I write.

I'm not sure about things that live in our hearts, Mikey...I mean, no offence, but yours stopped. What chance has mine got to preserve you forever...

So I'll make no promises with my heart, y'hear? But I'll tell you this, you'll always be in my feet and in my pelvis. Because without you there I have no hope of ever doing with them what you do.

I wish you peace, Mikey. As much as I possibly can wish. I think it was the one thing even you couldn't dance your way to.

Yours, in sequins and freaky hats,

Me

Waving

The main reason I haven't been writing is that I've been working, eating junk and sleeping. Not very exciting. Another, more complex reason is that this blog is accessible to too many people. It's nice, sometimes, to be found by some of them...but I tend to clam up when observed by too many.

Also, blame it on journalism, on being crammed into a writing/editing mould for 8 hours a day...but I have temporarily lost the ability to be random and totally honest.

Which means...if I'm crying bucketfuls of tears and snot, I can't lurch over to the laptop and type out a few broken lines through trembling fingers. I now write like somebody who edits copies that are read by a certain number of people.

In a way, it's great...it's just the kind of discipline I was looking for. But, the downside is that by the time I'm through with being a journalist (yes, I do stop) I'm too tired to write anything of my own.

I figured this out a few minutes ago while replying to a comment on my previous post. I used the word 'beautiful' in my response...and the word felt strange to my fingers. I haven't written it in a long time, you see.

No one's stopping me from being poetic and hyper-intense on my blog...it's just that the written word is taking on new meaning for me as a job

If you notice, this post is written in small paragraphs, like a news article :)

My typing speed, my spelling and grammar, my ability to read a page and point out at least five mistakes in it - all these are sharpening. For this I am grateful.

But there has to be a time when I write madly, uncaring of who might be reading it later. When I put italics in at my will and break sentences

just because it's fun.