Death By Lethal Affection:
Reflections On Inner and Outer Beauty

I wasn’t going to write about Michael Jackson or Farrah Fawcett. And I still don’t feel I am mentally equipped to write about these public figures. And as I write, I still don’t know why but I feel I must write this to satisfy these intellectual urges I have to create a verbal painting.

I didn’t know them personally like most who adored or abhorred them. I was a spectator like many to their work and contribution to society. More Michael Jackson than Farrah, I admit. I didn’t watch Charlie’s Angels. Just a few times as kid. It was part of surfing the TV channels. It wasn’t a highlight of my evening-especially in the ghetto. But something has struck me since I heard about their deaths. I wanted to make a connection in some way between the transitions of these beloved American icons. That word ‘icon’ seems too limiting in a sense, flooding our memory with images of superhumans with incredible skills and talents, both in their youth and older years. Their lives, however, represented an idea that spun itself through years and like most icons for ages.

Farrah’s physical beauty graced the pages of magazines and screens of television. She represented the myth of Western female beauty, in many ways, and the desire for break-out roles that dispelled the trappings of such beauty. Her role as a Charlie’s Angel will be forever etched in the memory of television and modeling. She was America’s Top Model before Tyra Banks and the women you see on TV and magazines today. Farrah wanted to step out of being pigeonholed as a ‘angel', yet left memorable impression upon the world with her pin-up poster.

Farrah infused the country with the spirit of physical beauty and all the joy and accolades of fame that such possession can bring in Western society that values its power and attention. Her smile, hair, and figure played a significant role in shaping how women viewed themselves during the 70’s and 80’s. Little would Fawcett know the impact of her later years compared to the younger years. The striking images flashing upon the screen of her last days revealed a woman engaged in a different challenge than the professional world of acting and modeling. What emerged from the Farrah of later years was a woman encountering a deeper sense of beauty through confronting the courage of her soul. As an audience, we saw her last greatest act-emerging as a dying heroine of her own life.

Michael Jackson, one of the most beloved icons in the world, possessed an incredible sense of insecurity towards his physical looks. His skin, nose, and looks belied logic as his dance movements and great talent for song and art. Those gifts brought such beauty and joy to millions of people around the world. Without a stage, Michael was an oddity: shy, hidden, though targeted by the media for being bizarre and weird. His private world was a bubble he created for his protection, safety, and love for life, youth, and imagination. For most of his life, that bubble was a bulls-eye target for the paparazzi and one that has escalated after his death.

Michael, in his pursuit of creating beauty through art and his own life, felt estranged from his own body and sought to manipulate his physical beauty as he believed was God’s will. Even as he continued to create musical hits and wonders, he affected our sense of identity by his physical changes, unnatural as they were in the public mind. Even more he was affected by his response to the changes as much as to the world’s response to those changes.

Both Michael and Farrah understood the essence of Beauty and its power: Farrah’s outer beauty, Michaels’ inner beauty. They were recognized for their talents, and in later years challenged by the shadows those talents would bring. So often we hear of celebrity struggles and the pain they endured towards the end of their lives as though our collective expectation is for them to be beyond struggle or suffering. Well, they are not nor ever will be. Whether you are famous or not, wealthy or not, every soul seeks to grow on the spiritual path.

However, no matter what the world believed about Michael and Farrah, these were two souls who endured magical moments in their live and difficult times. Their worlds, though separate, crossed in an era of fallen angels and icons. So embraced by the world for their beauty, and battles, and so affected millions were and forever will be by the legacy of their work and troubled lives. But their journey continues in worlds beyond ours, as they see their lives filled the hearts of many with an infinite Beauty.