Dear Michael,

Last night, on Dancing with the Stars, the final dance was a ridiculous group number to the classic song, Rockin’ Robin.   This song has been around forever, and has been released by several different artists, but without a doubt, my favorite version is yours, back from the early days. It captures your youthful energy, years before you became the King of Pop.   You were a star, even as a child.   And what an amazing child you were!   What talent.   I actually remember the days of the Jacksons, and those white spacesuits you would wear in your TV specials.

After “Dancing with the Stars,” I thought about you.   I watched a couple of your old videos on YouTube.   I love the Afro from the seventies! Everyone knew you were a brilliant singer and dancer back then, but no one expected your fame to shoot through the roof in the eighties.   I can’t think of any musical career like yours.   Is there anyone anywhere in the world who has never danced to a song on “Thriller?” (My favorite album is still “Off the Wall”)

I remember once being in Thailand, being driven in a tuk-tuk by a driver playing “Billie Jean” on the radio.

You were a role model to me, a symbol of a what could happen when you are talented.   You took your childhood talent and ran with it, eventually reaching the pinnacle of fame. You were the King of Pop!

And then you just went bonkers.   You seemed miserable.   You became the butt of jokes.   All my life, I was under the illusion that artistic success, fame, and fortune were the goals of life — and this would bring happiness to the one who attains it.   What went wrong with you?   Why were you fooling around with your face so much?   Who cares if you are gay/straight?   Didn’t anyone tell you that your obsession with young boys was unhealthy?   If I can find a good therapist in Los Angeles, couldn’t you?   It should have been as easy for you as… like your own song goes… ABC.

I hope you get your act together.   Maybe one day, you can go on tour again, maybe a couple of weeks in Las Vegas.   It would be a sellout.   I would go, unless it is really really expensive.   If so, I would just watch it on HBO a few months later.

If you don’t want to heal yourself for yourself, do it for me.   It makes me feel sad to think that you’re miserable.   If the King of Pop can’t be happy with everything he has, what hope is there for any of us?!