I do not allow “grown ups” on my Facebook page. I might have mentioned that before. My aunt is taking it personally as an ageist decision. It’s not. “Grown ups” are members of my family who I don’t feel need to see some of the day to day stuff that goes on in my life. It’s hard enough to go to a family gathering when I’m not sure how my son is going to react to sharing space with other people; I don’t need to walk in with the gossip about my latest hair color or tattoo having gone before me. 

Conversely, there are things about “grown ups” that I don’t need to know for similar reasons. Take, for example, my brother-in-law’s status “Michael Jackson was a freak. Can’t say I’ll miss him.”  

I am playing a game on Facebook that my son has gotten into. My husband has no interest in playing and I don’t want to set my almost 10 year old son up with a Facebook page just yet so I set the game up via my husband’s account. Not wanting my son to know his dad’s user information or see the potential messages he may receive, I have to log him into his dad’s Facebook account and whisk him past the newsfeed. In doing this the other day, I saw my brother-in-law’s status which I wouldn’t have ordinarily seen because I consider him to be in the grown up category.  

The message didn’t sit right with me. With my son standing over my shoulder, I moved past it. But yesterday I was gardening and it came back to me. None of us reading this blog will ever know the lack of childhood MJ had. When we were learning the 3 R’s, MJ was backstage with his brothers, and from what I’ve heard, a pretty domineering father. When said father realized the market value of an adorable, singing youngster, MJ himself was thrown onto the stage and became a trained monkey. Sure, he had money, fame, notoriety, but he didn’t ever get a good, stable foundation on which to rest those things.  

Am I saying it’s okay that he touched young boys inappropriately when he was older and should have known better? Absolutely not. Nothing in his older years pointed to someone with a practical side. I wouldn’t have let my children stay with him. Then again, I can’t imagine the pressure of having to top being Michel Jackson over, and over, and over. Off the Wall was good, Thriller brought MTV into a new era, what will be so good about Bad?  

Clearly the entourage around him didn’t do him any favors by continuing to allow him to make poor choices. Nose after nose, exotic collection after exotic collection, child friend after child friend. I watched a Remembering Michael show over the weekend with one of his past advisors who said he told MJ that he had to stop his extravagance…and was replaced soon after. He bought yes men who continued to fluff his ego. The expense of an alternate reality was very high. Even more than the King of Pop could profit. 

Michael wasn’t bad, he was sad. He tried to buy the innocence that he was never allowed. When people tried to tell him he couldn’t, he tried to prove he could- without them. Money can’t make your reality real. 

It must be nice to live in a Wonderbread world with mom and dad happily married, brothers and sisters playing in the backyard, nothing in the world to care about other than making the honor roll again so you can get into a good college and sit in judgment of people who are anything but Wonderbread.  

The world is made up of freaks who are pretty normal people when you get to know them. Then again, that requires opening your mind and not being judgmental. Those who seem the most privileged are often slaves to the forces that control them. I’m not just talking nose jobs and fantasy land estates.  

My Facebook page is and will remain a Neverland Ranch for freaks. If you’re not comfortable there, you’re free to leave. And grownups with their preconceived notions are not allowed through the gates. 

Enjoy!