Thrill the World 2009

Thrill the World is a worldwide event, established in 2006, to break the world record of most people simultaneously dancing the Michael Jackson “Thriller” dance. Last year, the record was 4,179 people from 10 nations.

This year, it’s being reported that 22,923 people danced in 32 countries!

I first heard of Thrill the World soon after Michael Jackson died, but there wasn’t a local event scheduled at the time. Around the end of September, though, I saw on the news that things had changed over the past few months, and NOW there were some local events happening.

Over 200 dancers had already signed up at the local chapter I chose by the time I got to it, and my schedule really didn’t allow time to rehearse the dance, so I decided to be a volunteer instead. I got my mom involved as well!

The volunteers had one meeting the week before the event to get a feel for the area, meet each other, and go over a general layout of how the event would unfold and who would be needed where. The dance was scheduled to start (in our time zone) at exactly 8:30pm, but volunteers had to show up at 3:30pm (with dancers showing up soon after) to organize everything. It was hours of preparation on our part,  and days / weeks of preparation for those who were in charge of organizing the event as a whole (gaining permission for space used, advertising, etc) for six minutes of dancing! Although as some saying goes, it’s the journey that’s the fun part, not the final destination–and, boy, was that true here.

On Friday, the 23rd of October (the day before the dance), I felt pretty sick. I was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to attend after all. Determined, I kept going anyway; I didn’t want to miss out after weeks of looking forward to the event.

Since there was very little money for the event, the volunteers had no uniform or anything to signify volunteer status to the public or each other. We simply ended up having a strip of orange streamer paper tied around our upper arm (or neck, for some people). Volunteers were allowed to dress up just like the dancers–which I’d planned from the start–but I wasn’t sure about my clothes up until the last minute.

My mom and I looked around some stores briefly, on the 22nd of October, searching for Michael Jackson t-shirts that were light colored, for better visibility in the dark. There was hardly anything out anymore though, which surprised us. We ended up finding two white shirts that featured Michael dancing across the top, so we bought those just to have SOMETHING.

I wasn’t too happy with the shirt though, so we looked around at another store quickly. There were no Michael shirts there, either, but I did happen across a red jacket. I pulled up a photo of the “Thriller” jacket on my phone and roughly laid out a plan in my head of how to throw it all together using cheap materials and things I had at my house.

I put off creating the jacket until the night before the show, not realizing I’d be feeling rather sick that night. It was still a pretty simple creation though, and I figured focusing on putting everything together would help distract me from how crappy I felt–and I was right.

Black duct tape was used for the basic design, which didn’t take long to put together. Then, I had a bag full of old belts that I planned to tear apart and sew onto the jacket, but I ended up only using one in the end. It was a large, large, black belt that had gone around a white shirt once and which I was never going to use for anything. I cut it in half and then cut a chunk out of the middle and sewed the two pieces to the bottom of the jacket. I only sewed the ends to the jacket and then let the rest of it hang off (you can just barely make it out in the photo above). My favorite things about Michael Jackson’s performance outfits are all the belts and zippers and clanky things in general. I’m planning on creating more complicated outfits in the future in this fashion, but that’s digressing from this particular post a bit too much!

Anyway, my final outfit consisted of the pants / shoes / socks combination in the photo that starts off this entry, the Michael Jackson shirt my mom and I bought, the jacket, a wrapped up “bloody” right arm, and full face makeup (with some spray-in hair color as well).

The day of the event, I had some other things I had to take care of in the morning / early afternoon, and as I was finishing up and driving home … the car died. My brother and I have been sharing a car, and it was low on gas that day, but I hadn’t realized just how low it was (and also wasn’t entirely aware of how much my brother had driven it the previous day).  Long story short, I had to get picked up and leave the car in a parking lot I’d managed to cough it along into–but it all eventually turned out all right.

It did end up making us late though. When I was finally able to get home, I changed clothes quickly, pinned my hair up and quickly sprayed in the color and messed it up a bit, then I grabbed my makeup and jumped in the car.

Using a combination of face makeup (white and black) I’d bought from a Halloween store, black and maroon eyeshadow, and black eyeliner, I created this look in about 25 minutes during the drive to St. Pete. I based the brow region on the makeup used on Johnny Depp in Sweeney Todd and I blacked up the base of my nails with a marker, borrowing from a photo by Joshua Hoffine.

When we arrived, we were seated at the front table for dancers to pick up their waivers (I’m second from left in the photo, having my duties explained to me).  We stayed there until around 7pm.

My mom and I took a break at a point to go back to the car and eat something before we would be held up for quite a while, lining up the dancers and such, and not getting another chance to have a break until the whole thing was over. As we were walking down the length of the pier to the car, this group of people rode past us in some sort of small cart, and shouted out to me, “MICHAEL! MICHAEL! CAN WE GET A PHOTO WITH YOU!” I was kind of surprised, but I said “sure!” and they hopped out and posed with me. Apparently, it was part of some kind of scavenger hunt they were on to find someone dressed as Michael Jackson and take a photo with him/her, haha.

I really should have worn this hat there.

Anyway, soon after we came back from our break, it was time to go outside and start setting up the dance area.

All the dancers were grouped together and awaiting our instruction (btw, if you want LOADS more photos of the event, beyond just mine, visit here!)

My mom and I walked down to the far end of “dance” area (the road leading up to The Pier) and were  instructed to line up the dancers as they walked towards us. We put one arm up to signify who we were and the zombies started towards us.

We created four lines, two on my side and two on my mom’s side. I walked down the row of zombies with my arms outstretched on my sides, to make sure they had decent room between them, and instructed them to spread their arms out the same to correctly distance themselves from those standing next to them. It all went pretty smoothly and everyone was soon lined up without much of a problem.

Soon after that, the dance instructor called for a dress rehearsal, so I ran off the dance floor and stood with the other volunteers in front of The Pier building / giant screen. I hadn’t seen any of that version of the dance, myself, so it was all new to me too (the dance in the video only runs about 2 minutes, so it was revamped a bit by the dance instructor to run 6 minutes). It looked AMAZING, and everyone errupted in applause after it was finished.

After that, some people spoke briefly, sponsers were thanked, and then we took a head count of the zombies–each one saying their number in order (“1, 2, 3…”) and then sitting down afterward. We were all a bit crestfallen to see that, while 400 dancers had signed up, only 198 were on the dance floor. Still though, it didn’t exactly damper our spirits completely.

Nobody was allowed on the dancefloor but the dancers after that point, to follow the instructions given to us by the world records people, and we had a bit of trouble with that here and there, but nothing we couldn’t handle.

At 8:29pm, on a global call with Canada (where the base of this whole event is located), we all started a countdown going backwards from 60.

And then…

A close up of the dance instructor dancing on the small stage in front of all the dancers, to lead them (for anyone who wants to see details of the dance):

If you watch the first video fully, you will see someone in the lower corner walk out onto the dance floor right at the end of the dance. Barely out of frame are the volunteers (me included), who all started to FREAK at that moment.

The interuptee was a mentally retarded young woman, who my mom had apparently spoken to earlier in the evening, trying to explain that she need to clear the area during the actual dance. She had somehow made her way from the opposite end of the dance area to next to where we were, and she walked out so quickly that none of us knew what was going on until she was right in the dance area. None of us realized she was retarded until the last moment, either; we’d all thought she would stop before she entered the dance area until we saw she wasn’t just any other person who would understand the rules.

We’re still waiting on the list with details on who was part of breaking the record to see if she disqualified us or not, but honestly, it wasn’t so much about breaking a record as it was about just being there and having fun, so whatever.

After the dance, the volunteers went back to what was the makeup room before to make sure all the dancers signed out. Apparently, the dance was done again almost right after “THE” dance, so we had adequate time to prepare for the rush afterward (all dancers had to sign in and sign out as one of the many steps in the full package of being counted for the record). This was the moment we’d worried about the most in preparation, because of the huge rush of people all at once, but it went smoothly!

That was the end mark. It was all over.

Well, almost.

There was an after party at one of the restaurants in The Pier. Lots of Michael Jackson music was played and there was LOTS of dancing. Of course, the DJ played “Thriller” a few times as well, and the dancers got to get their groove on a few more times that night. It was spectacular.

At one point, “Dancing Machine” by The Jackson 5 was played, and I mentioned how someone really should do The Robot (see Michael dancing from 1:20-1:40 in the above video), and then I saw this one girl on the dance floor do it–and do it marvelously. I applauded and shouted from my seat and when she looked in my direction, I pointed at her and mouth “You are great!” which made her blush a bit and lose focus on her dancing, whoops! She was really a treat to see dance though, in every form. She nailed everything.

Soon after that, during the second time “Thriller” was played, I looked away from the dancers briefly and saw “Michael” standing on the side with a friend, watching it all. I was immediately like, “HAHA. LOOK, IT’S MICHAEL!” to everyone around me. Then I took out my phone and said to my mom, “OMG, come take a picture!”

We went over to them and I went right up to him and asked for a photo and he agreed

After that,  he walked around for a bit, posing for photos with other people and kids. As we were getting ready to leave, “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough” came on, and I was like YESSSS and went out to dance some (for the first time). Michael walked in from being out on the patio, and I pointed at him and yelled, “GET OUT HERE!” and he pointed to himself and mimed “Me?” and I laughed and yelled, “YES, YOU. GET OUT OF HERE!”

As he made a move to come to the dancefloor, I realized I might have screwed up the guy’s whole act because I had no idea if he could dance or not.

Hahaha. Yeah, right! That dude grooved onto the dance floor and did some impressive moves before doing a spin and ending it posed on his toes. EVERYONE applauded.

THEN he turned around and danced up to me and we fell into dancing together with probably less than an inch between us. I was laughing and telling him that I can’t dance, trying to follow his footsteps, but he didn’t seem to mind. He was laughing and said he liked my jacket. Aww, haha. Then he did a kick and a spin and came back around with some wrist moves, singing along a bit to the song. Then the song started to near the end, so he slid his hand across my shoulders as he walked away, and with a smile in his voice, he said, “Thanks a lot, sweetheart!” and disappeared.

And he did literally disappear. I didn’t see him anywhere again after that.

That concludes this MEGA POST.

Have a safe and happy Halloween, everyone!

Preface – Are you okay, Annie?

June 25, 2009 will forever be etched into my mind. I think maybe I should borrow the lines of the Fresh Prince here: “Now, this is a story all about how my life got flipped-turned upside down!” But in all seriousness, Michael Jackson’s death was a real (and incredibly unexpected) jolt to my life.

The evening of the twenty-fifth, I had a class (which met around 6pm, I believe), and I was lying down for a bit before leaving. My ex called me at about 5:30-5:45 and we talked briefly, which made me a bit late. After hanging up, I came out of my room to rush and put my shoes on and go out the door. It was then that I received a rundown of the news from my mom of Farrah Fawcett dying and Michael Jackson being in a coma. I think my reaction was just simply “…….what?!” but I had a class to get to, so I didn’t really think deeply about any of it.

When I got in the car and turned on the radio, I was greeted with the end of “Billie Jean.” Since that’s one of my favorite Michael Jackson songs, I started grooving along right away and felt pretty good. I remember momentarily thinking, “Wow, it sucks that it takes him being in a coma to get people to play his music,” but that thought didn’t last long … because once the music ended, the announcement came over that Michael Jackson had just died.

I was backing down the driveway, head turned to look out the back window as I did so, and I ended up slamming my face against the seat as my foot pressed down on the break HARD and rocked the whole car. I picked up my cell phone and dialed my mom (who was inside the house, obviously), then continued to back down the driveway as I told her what I’d just heard. It was all a strange reaction from me, since no other celebrity deaths over the past few years has impacted me at all, and I wasn’t exactly closely following Michael Jackson, either.

Anyway, I arrived at campus and walked into the building my class was in. I turned the last corner and saw the TV on, talking about Michael’s death, and the two janitors sitting in front of it in disbelief. I wanted to say something to them, but I didn’t because I was already late. I still think of that moment whenever I pass that corner.

Continuing on, I got into my class and started on my lesson, but the silence started to drive me crazy at a point. The class was done individually on computers, so it was essentially a study hall of sorts, which I normally love, but that day, I absolutely hated it. I couldn’t understand how everyone could be so quiet and everything remain so normal when Michael Jackson had just DIED. I wondered how many people in the class even knew about it, since I only knew because I’d been late. I kept quiet though and tried to stay focused on my work, but those two hours were the longest two hours of my life.

When I got home, despite how I felt, I kept rolling my eyes at how EVERYONE had to update EVERYTHING mentioning Michael’s death. I’ve pretty much felt that way for every celebrity death that’s happened recently. There’s always an influx of posts about the person and everyone becomes their biggest fan for a week and it all feels really fake and offensive to me. I thought the fact that I was scoffing at everything was a sign that the weird way I’d reacted earlier that evening was just a fluke.

Well, it wasn’t.

I became pretty severely depressed for about a week after Michael died. And it really freaked me out. The worst part was that I didn’t know how to articulate exactly WHY I was sad. I also felt I had nobody to talk to who wouldn’t just laugh at me. I kept it all to myself and eventually ended up crying uncontrollably one night, alone in my room, after some small thing my mom said to me (which I can’t even recall anymore) just triggered everything I’d been holding in to spill over.

I started to get it back together after the Memorial, which I only watched a small portion of. But it helped me have a definite door to close on the issue, thank God.

At some point in all of this, I visited with my therapist and discussed the issue a bit. I think I ended up crying in that session too. I managed to find the words for why I felt so bad, at least. Although I was born in the mid-eighties and have very little memory of Michael Jackson being “MICHAEL FUCKING JACKSON” and not “Whacko Jacko” and such, I still was always on his side in everything, albiet quietly. I realized that, while I’d intentionally kept a distance from being a really devoted fan (in order to avoid ridicule), I’d still always kept an eye on what he was doing and hoped for him to have a comeback / fairy tale ending to everything. When his story instead ended extremely abruptly and tragically, it tore me the fuck up. I felt like my childhood and, in some sense, hope had died with him.

As some background into my personal life to give this some context: since 2006, there has been a death in my family each year–mostly due to cancer–and each time occurring right at the holiday season. Then, of course, there has been my own mental health issues, along with my brother’s cancer diagnosis this year. It’s been pretty rough, to put it lightly. And apparently, for me, Michael’s death closed the door completely to a certain period of my life; he was the last link to my childhood and past in general.

But, as the saying goes, when one door closes, another one opens up. In the months since his death, I’ve had a complete turnaround in everything. His death kick-started my life.

Every breath you take is someone’s death in another place.
Every healthy smile is hunger and strife to another child.
But the stars do shine and promising salvation is near this time.

- The Jacksons

While I’m still saddened by his passing, the positive impacts I’ve seen from it–in my own life or in others–have made the hope that I thought died with him return to me threefold. I believe his real legacy lies not so much in his amazing talents as a performer, but in his ability to bring the world together and teach us to love and heal each other. He also taught the world to never give up on what you love, even if you feel everyone else has abandoned you. Michael Jackson had amazing strength in many forms, and is a true inspiration to me in every way possible–spirit, endurance, motivation, healing.

I truly believe in Elizabeth Taylor’s recent quote in reference to Michael: “[...] Say to yourselves, ‘I saw genius in my lifetime.’”

New update … coming soon!

I have a HUGE post to make in the next few days.

Until then, watch this to get in the mood

Concerning my artwork and a charity project

A few months ago, I was approached online and asked to donate some Michael Jackson related artwork for an art project / tribute book, the money from sales ALL being donated to sick children. I liked the idea, so I gave permission for the above painting to be used in the book.

Here is a short video (not made by me) that describes the project & gives some details of what the book looks like (my artwork is included).

More background information on the project can be viewed at this site.

The book can be ordered here.

If you’re not interested in buying a copy yourself, please pass the word around to others you know who might!

I’m proud to have been involved in this project, and I really hope it does well