The self proclaimed King of Pop is dead and his body lays at the Los Angeles County Coroner's office, which I drive past daily on my way to work. Talk about a media frenzy surrounding this location at the intersection of Marengo Street and Mission Road. I was ready to call in to work and tell them that I was going to be late.
As we traveled southbound on Mission Road from Valley Boulevard I could see traffic backed up and what looked like a motorcade of white trucks off to the side. As we neared Mission and Zonal I could distinguish the white trucks as media vehicles equipped with huge satellite dishes.
They lined both sides of Mission Road reducing traffic to one lane each side, which explained why we were jammed like sardines. Everywhere I looked I saw Digital SLRs with behemoth lenses and flanks of video cameras pointed at the gates leading to the Coroner's office, each group prepared to capture a glimpse of anything.
This media circus was a perfect reflection of Jackson's real life. He reveled in the spotlight and courted the attention and adulation of thousands, now they waited around the world for final word of what caused his untimely death.
The throngs of reporters, photographers and fans was simply too much. I wanted my carpool friend to get us the hell out of there. It was stifling to see so many people in one place jockeying for position and for a very brief moment I felt I could understand what celebrities experience daily. It's paralyzing and crushing and something I hope to never experience again.
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