Michael Jackson and me

All this Michael Jackson coverage has "Human Nature" rattling around in my head. This goofy song I have not thought about in years.

Or heard, I might add. If Jackson was so huge, how come we have not heard this stuff for years? It was not in radio rotation so far as I knew. That is, when I walked into restaurants and stores and whatever, I was barraged with all kinds of other stuff, but not this.

I have also not heard "Beat It" for years. Or "Billie Jean."

Which makes me think: They will not be listening to these songs in 100 years. Sorry.

However, I sympathize with Jackson in one respect. That is the insomniac business.

I was reading just now about how he was an insomniac and wanted this drug, this sedative. It sounded like a terrible sedative. The story gave me the impression that if you took this drug, you might not wake up. You had to have a nurse in the room with you to wake you in eight hours.

Imagine that!

It is like "Romeo and Juliet"!

The worst I have ever taken is Ambien which, I still have a bottle around somewhere. That is a souvenir of my year or so as a serious insomniac. I was the worst! I got into this groove where I just did not sleep three days out of the week. Then sometimes I could not sleep for two or three nights in a row. Incredible! I used to talk about that with Leonard Pennario because he had sleep problems too.

But then I went to the sleep doctor and he straightened me out without drugs and all I can think is that would have worked for Michael Jackson too. It is pretty simple. They do not let you go to bed before midnight and for five nights you have to get up at 5 a.m., then five nights at 5:15 a.m., and so on, until you are sleeping like a normal human being.

You are so tired you have no choice but to sleep! So you turn your pattern around and now I am a good sleeper.

I do not know why more people do not undergo that therapy. I hear it referred to as "last-resort." Last resort? It should be first resort! Drugs should be last resort. Those sleeping pills, they beat you up bad.

What I am getting at is, I feel a little of Michael Jackson's pain. I remember what that is like, when you cannot sleep and you are all exhausted and frightened and panicked. You start to think you are losing your mind. Here is a picture of me as an insomniac, a couple of years ago.


I believe that is where Michael Jackson was at, as we like to say here in Buffalo.

It is not fun, not sleeping.

Here is one thing funny. You are always hearing songs and poetry with the gist of "I've been up all night, and I'm waiting for the dawn, the new day brings hope."

When you are sleeping you do not want to see that dawn. That new day does not bring hope, I will tell you that right now. Whoever writes songs and poetry like that has not ever been up all night.

Unlike Michael Jackson.

And me.