Tonight, the world will pay its public tribute to the greatest individual entertainer that has ever walked the Earth. I will be watching, as will millions (billions?) of others across the world, silently paying my last respects to a man who led a deeply flawed life but who, above all else, brought joy and happiness to more people than is even fathomable.

With a full work day still between now and Michael Jackson’s public memorial service tonight at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, I will use my space here at MSF and my daily allotted time for blogging to pay my own personal tribute to my favorite musician of all time.

My apologies in advance to those of you who came here this morning hoping for sports talk, or those of you who may be sick and tired of all the Michael Jackson coverage over the past week and a half. As I drove in this morning, thinking as I always do about what to write, I couldn’t get the Gloved One out of my mind. I have wanted to write something ever since hearing of his passing, but never really considered any of my rapid fire thoughts to be coherent or complete enough to comprise a post. But the way I see it, considering the endless hours of musical friendship I have personally derived from Michael Jackson’s voluminous catalog of sublime songs and videos, I owe the man a public statement of my affection for his incredible career.

That is mainly what this is about: Michael’s career as a musician. Yet, it is impossible to separate the man from his music. And as we all know, discussing Michael Jackson the man is an extraordinarily complicated subject; but we’ll get to that in a bit.

The music is the primary reason why so many people were deeply saddened by the news of Michael’s passing last week. Millions upon millions of people who have never met Michael Jackson, many of whom (like me) who have never even seen him live, found themselves swept up in a maelstrom of melancholy in the aftermath of Michael’s untimely death. As Michael once poignantly sang about Ryan White: gone too soon.

Who could have imagined that Michael Jackson would sing his own eulogy a couple of decades before his own passing?

I have unquestionably been one of those people deeply saddened by Michael’s passing. The reason is that it feels somewhat like the death of an old friend. Granted, it’s a friend that you’ve fallen out of touch with over the years, a friend that you’ve struggled to watch deal with the realities of life and the world, but with all great friendships there was something there at one time that formed a bond. Michael Jackson, like perhaps no other musician ever, had the ability to form bonds with his fans. I don’t know how he would have answered the question, “how many friends do you have?” I suspect that it would have depended on his mood, but I am almost certain he would have greatly underestimated the number.

Michael Jackson had the unique ability and opportunity over some 40+ years making music to build friendships with perhaps more people than any other human being that has ever walked this earth. I challenge you to think long and hard about that statement before you cast it aside as hyperbole. Of course he did not build personal friendships will all of these people; they were friendships formed out of the bonds of music, but friendships nonetheless in my opinion.

Think about how many times you listened to Beat It or Thriller while driving in your car, gyrating around in your seat and belting out the lyrics at the top of your lungs. These are moments that friends share together.

Think about how often you may have been sad or down, and a song like Heal the World or Man in the Mirror lifted you up through the empathy and hope that emanated from every note that came from the singer’s magnificent voice. These are moments that friends share together.

Think about how many times you went out and ended up dancing the night away to songs like Billie Jean, Shake Your Body, and, in his later years, You Rock My World. These are moments that friends share together.

And think about how many times you just wanted to chill out, relax, and enjoy good company…and how many times that included songs like Remember the Time and Rock With You playing in the background. These are moments that friends share together.

As you might expect, I could go on and on. And I could go on for hours listing out all of my favorite Michael Jackson songs and telling you the specific memories associated with them.

I could talk about performing Billie Jean during karaoke night at the bowling alley the first time I hung out with all of my Delta Sigma Pi pledge brothers in college…and then how they always looked over at me for my goofy, uncoordinated version of the moonwalk every time the song came on after that.

I could talk about how every time I feel unsettled, or feel as if my personal choices are holding me back from something, I have thrown on Man in the Mirror and left the song feeling much more confident in my own ability to “make a change.”

I could talk about how I used to play basketball on my little Nerf hoop in the basement when I was younger, and how one day while doing so I stopped and watched the TV mesmerized the first time I saw the video for Black or White, especially the part at the end when the faces morph in and out. I remember thinking about it then, and in years since, how ironic it was that a man who was slowly morphing from black to white wrote a song discussing how it does not matter if you’re black or white; and how despite the irony, he was right.

The memories could go on for days. And I suppose that is my point. My most cherished friends are the ones with whom I’ve shared the most memorable experiences. I can go months, even years in some cases, without talking to these friends, but when we do talk or see eachother those old wonderful memories always come back. And in the best of those friendships, the bonds of those memories are the catalysts for new ones.

That’s how I view Michael Jackson.

I still remember the day it all changed with Michael Jackson. It was that sad, bizarre day in 1993 when he went on TV to proclaim his innocence against the first child molestation charges that were brought against him. He looked paler than I’d ever seen him, and his face even seemed to have changed shape from what I most recently remembered. He began describing what he had gone through, including having his nude body investigated and photographed by cops, and, being 11 or 12 at the time, I didn’t know what to think. Here was a guy that looked nothing like the guy on the cover of the Thriller album, and even less like the little kid fronting the Jackson 5, which I was obsessed with listening to at the time, courtesy of my mom. This same guy who I’d heard about doing so many great things for kids was now being investigated for molesting one. Michael Jackson? It just didn’t compute or make sense.

And sadly, it was a precursor to so many other things in his life after that that would not compute or make sense.

We all know what happened thereafter. Michael settled out of court and the charges have since become widely viewed as a ploy from the accusing family to make money. This was not the end of Michael’s legal troubles, however, as he also stood trial for child molestation just a few years ago. This time the scene was even more bizarre, with Michael showing up one day in pajama pants and appearing as frail and weak as I’d ever seen him. Based on what we know about Michael’s two-decades long struggle with painkillers, it would not surprise me to find out that he was high as a kite that day.

Michael was acquitted of the most charges as well, but I think questions about his guilt or innocence still linger in most peoples’ mind. They do even in my own, and no one has wanted to see the “good” in Michael Jackson over the years more than me. But at some point his life and personality reached a level of absurdity where anything become possible.

And I think this is where a lot of debates about Michael Jackson begin. Many people, including a very good friend of mine who I talked about this with recently, claim to have zero sympathy for Michael Jackson. He has achieved such success, made so much money, had so many opportunities, people like my friend say, that empathy and sympathy are unnecessary. He led a tragic life? So be it. He is a man and made his own choices, and why should he deserve any more sympathy than someone else who led a tragic life but did not have 1/100,000th of Michael Jackson’s fame, money, or fortune?

I can see a point in that, to a certain extent. But I also believe that a man who has given so much to so many deserves special consideration. Yes, Michael Jackson had a ridiculous desire to be the best at everything, to make as much money as possible, and he spent it like nobody’s business. But he also gave so much of it away, and so much of his motivation to be successful was to have the opportunity to give back. Think about all of the people who were sick or dying and were touched either personally, or indirectly through his money and music, by Michael Jackson. Think about all of the people across the world who had frowns on their face one minute, and then 30 seconds later were smiling because of a Michael Jackson song.

Getting back to a point from earlier, perhaps the most ironic thing of all about “Black or White” is that there really is nothing black or white about Michael Jackson. So much of his life and legacy will forever live in the gray area, in the world of “yeah, buts.” And while I will always celebrate and cherish Michael Jackson’s career and music for its excellence, I will always look at him — especially in his later years, but even before that — as a sad and sympathetic figure who did undoubtedly lead a tragic life.

Michael Jackson has always seemed bigger than life. Shoot, forget “seemed.” He has always been bigger than life. And while his prodigious talents, diverse life experiences, and magnificent accomplishments make him different from any other person in the history of the world, his struggles to cope with it all make him very, very ordinary.

The abuse Michael suffered as a child, at the hands of his father Joe, has been well documented. And it is easy and legitimate, as it is with so many of us, to trace many of Michael Jackson’s emotional issues to his childhood experiences. Yet, and here is where the gray area comes in again, would Michael ever have become the “King of Pop” without his father’s drive in those early days? I would not argue with you if you called Joe Jackson a heartless, opportunistic scumbag who used his children as pawns in his own personal quest to live out his unrequited dreams of musical stardom. But would his sons have become “The Jackson 5″ without his vision? Would the Jackson family have gotten out of Gary, Indiana and been able to live the life of fortune and opportunity they’ve lived without Joe’s dogged determination and discipline?

Perhaps Michael’s prodigious musical gifts, and those of his brothers, were so great that he and they would have become superstars no matter what. I doubt it though. But might they, especially Michael, have been happier otherwise? Who knows. These are questions that people who read about the Jackson family, like I have, wonder about all the time. And they define the gray area that I believe Michael lived in throughout his life, and that I think contributed to the demons and eccentricities that have made him both the “King of Pop” and the “King of Punchline.”

Would Michael have so easily succumbed to drug addiction had he been happier and more settled on the inside? Who knows. Drug addiction is so prevalent in our society and spans every socio-economic class imaginable that there really is not predictor for it. What I do know, as someone who has personally dealt with the struggles of addiction on a far, far less nefarious scale (nicotine), and who comes from a family that has dealt with addictions similar to Michael’s, is that his addictions and his demons do not make him a bad person. I believe he was an amazingly benevolent and generous person with an enormous heart, just one who was saddled with demons he could not outrun. I will never remove personal responsibility from any discussion of addiction, nor do I want to come across as too strong of an MJ apologist, but at the end of day I do empathize and sympathize with his struggles. And I’ve always tried to understand him before I’ve judged him.

Considering all he’s given to me, I’ve always felt a sense of obligation to do so. My feelings about his life are much more complicated and nuanced now than they were back when I was kid, but just like I’d never give up on a family member or friend who was struggling, I’ve always found it impossible to give up on Michael. Sadly and tragically, I get the sense that he may have, over the years, somewhat given up on himself. Maybe not consciously, and certainly not willingly, but at the end of the day he could never find the help, the solace, the panacea that would allow him to live in peace.

The totality of his life is what makes Michael Jackson one of the most fascinating figures we’ve ever seen. And for those of you who cannot understand the outpouring of love and support and coverage that Michael Jackson’s death has galvanized, that is why. He was a truly unique individual in almost every way. In many ways good, and in many ways not so good (especially for himself). The one request I would make, at the behest of Michael himself, comes right out of one of his songs:

Before you judge me, try hard to love me, look within your heart then ask.

If, after doing so, you still do not care, or cannot empathize, or cannot understand, so be it. But do understand that for so many of us, Michael Jackson is woven into the fabric of our lives like waves in an ocean. True, many of us have been fondly remembering the Michael we all knew from the 70s, 80s, and early 90s, but we are mourning the man. And while the man who passed away in 2009 bore little resemblance to the one we all became friends with and admirers of back in the day, he was still Michael Jackson. No, he never fought in a war, And no, he never cured disease. And no, he never brokered world peace. And yes, in the grand scheme of things, there are issues in the world more important than Michael Jackson. But I defy you to find someone who was not a religious leader of some sort who inspired more joy, smiles, and happiness across the globe than Michael Jackson.

That is absolutely worth celebrating, and the tragic passing of the man responsible is absolutely worth mourning.

Fans like myself always looked at Michael Jackson as some sort of superhuman force of nature, a man of this world but not really. And the truth is that this is an image Michael tried to cultivate over the years as a way to receive as much love and adoration as he could. But while he could scale any musical mountain out there, he had Mount Everests in his own life, like we all do, that proved to be a daily challenge. Ultimately, sadly, Michael’s unscalable personal mountains led to him passing way before his time.

As he said, gone too soon, but only after packing 1,000 lifetimes of musical and humanitarian achievement into one short but scintillating 50-year life on this Earth, and with a legacy that will live in perpetuity. Michael Jackson will be missed, and more importantly, he will be eternally loved by so many. I doubt it, but I hope he realized that before he took his final breaths.

Rest in peace Michael. Thank you for giving your life to entertain and enlighten ours.

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I will leave you with my two favorite Michael Jackson performances ever, both of the same song, my favorite of his: Billie Jean.

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* – Michael Jackson when he was young photo credit: Musical Stew Daily

* – Michael Jackson screenshot from 1993 TV conference photo credit: MTV

* – Michael Jackson Billie Jean photo credit: VerboseComa.com