Watching it last night and thinking about it today, I feel like I'm 15-years old again hearing Jim Morrison's voice for the first time. And, I cannot put into words how that feels and how much it means to me. It's an emotion that's indescribable. The best way I've ever known how to put it was like this: I just wanted to crawl into Jim Morrison's voice and hide. There was always a comfort and healing that I could find when I would hear him sing. His words always seemed to sum up the apartness from others I felt as a teenager. Like he understood. It was as if Jim Morrison's voice finally gave me my own.
Now, before you go thinking the worst, let me just tell you that I have a loving family, great parents, great sisters and brothers. I had friends who are still my friends, and I cherish their friendship deeply. I was never ostracized in any way in high school, actually the opposite. I was involved in many extra-curricular activities and could never really have been categorized as a loner. Very normal.
But, here's the thing: For me to be normal took a huge amount of effort. Now, that's not to say that others didn't find me a little weird or maybe a lot weird, they did. I just didn't let my total freak flag fly, as they say. I kept most of my far-out thoughts and ideas closely to myself. I couldn't be the true and real me. So, to make me feel better, I retreated to music, and the Doors were the perfect answer. Dark, moody, weird, far-out, everything their music has been described as summed me up perfectly. All you have to do is listen to "People Are Strange" and know that Jim Morrison felt alienated from others. And, so did I. We meshed perfectly.
And, for years the Doors and Jim Morrison were my solace and my world. I have books, posters, cd's and albums, shirts, hats, whatever you like that are a testament to that. If you wanted to know what I was like as a person, listen to their music because I wore my Doors affiliation like a badge of honor. One of my senior pictures is even Doors-themed. You get the drift.
Then, one day it changed. I'm sure it wasn't just a snap of the fingers, and boom, I'm normal. Because I'm just as strange as I always was. But now, I'm happier, more content with life, less angsty. I don't know if I just grew up or just had heard "Light My Fire" one too many times, but I didn't need Jim Morrison as much anymore. And that scared the hell out of me. Not only did I feel like a traitor to some sort of legacy, but I felt like a traitor to my younger self. Before if someone asked me who my favorite band was, who my idol was, I could answer without even taking a breath, The Doors - Jim Morrison. Now that wasn't the case anymore. I wasn't the "me" I had always known. And, it made me incredibly sad. I was leaving the past behind, and with it, Jim Morrison. Or, so I thought.
Last night reminded me that he's never far from my consciousness. Just watching him, hearing him speak, hearing him sing, listening to Johnny Depp speak about his meteoric rise, eventual fall and then his death just reiterated to me how much he is a part of me. I relived all the emotions I always had concerning his life and death. He was, is, and always will be a part of me.
Jim Morrison was so many things: singer, poet, alcoholic, icon, rebel, dangerous, sex symbol, etc. But, to me, he was and is so much more. And, for that I'm so grateful. A lot of him made me who I am today.
So thank you Jim Morrison, wherever you are.
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