Bedtime Blog for Today

There have been times in my life when I've heard really big-deal news
and will never forget where I was, like today learning that Michael
Jackson had died. This was a huge deal for me. As a child I loved the
icon and his music and his moves. My favorite songs were always his I
remember "moon walking" for my grandparents when I was like 4, which
was basically just walking backwards and moving my shoulders up and
down, one at a time. My first show-and-tell in kindergarten was my red
tape player, with MJ's face airbrushed onto the speakers. Annie are
you okay? I always thought he was singing about me and when i was old
enough to know he wasn't, I still pretended he was. Michael Jackson
was a big part of my childhood. Today, after walking out of an evening
Zumba class completely spent, I overheard two guys talking and looking
up at a tv and caught that someone had died. It's weird in moments
like these--all of a sudden, you totally start talking to complete
strangers and there's this really raw, intimate exchange, you share
the exact same moment with someone you don't even know. So I ask the
guy who died, he tells me and then his friend chimes in and we sort of
stand around and talk about Michael Jackson for a couple of minutes,
in total shock, then we all kind of snap out of the same shocked
reverie then just sort of mumble "Take care" or something just as
trite and wander off. And you'll always remember that exchange you
had with two total strangers after walking out of Zumba class.

I still remember what the woman looked like who told me that the World
Trade Center had just been hit by an airplane that morning on the
subway. She had orange bifocals. At one point while walking the NYC
streets minutes after it happened, after emerging from underground, I
ducked inside a sandwich shop and witnessed the deli guy watch his
little TV in the corner and silently cry, right there in front of me.
"Can you believe what just happened?" we asked each other. It was so
odd, that exchange.

When Elizabeth Smart was found, I was at Go's med school weight
lifting competition. A guy who was off to the side on a computer
suddenly blurted out "They found her! They found Elizabeth Smart!" I
ran over to his computer and read the page. I didn't know him, but
there I was right over his shoulder, breathing down his neck, tears
streaming down my race, totally unabashed.

But now that I think of it, maybe it's weird that we don't have more
moments like these--that we are so closed off from each other that it
takes something so emotionally jarring for us to have a real momentary
connection with another person when we wouldn't otherwise. It's just
weird. ...Goodnight.

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