Thursday, June 25, 2009

Soul Cocina Remembers MJ

In my third grade class all the kids tried to make the bones in our wrist stick out like MJ's did on the inside of the Thriller album. I was really into records even in third grade. If I recall correctly, back then in 1983, 8-track was dying out and cassettes had not come into popular use yet, so vinyl was the main source of recorded music. Madonna wasn't popular yet among the third graders, but she would become our next star in fourth grade with the release of "Like a Virgen". I never had any of her records, by the time she was popular a year or two later, we had moved onto cassette tapes and walkmen. Prince was huge. I stared at his Purple Rain album for almost as many hours as I stared at the Thriller album. I also had records by Van Halen and the Police. I pretended that Beat It was my favorite song. A tough song. Thriller too. But in reality, my favorite was "Human Nature". Oh, and "The Girl Is Mine" with Paul McCartney also. What did I cook back then? Meat rolls. They were thick homemade tortillas wrapped around cold cuts and sliced cheese. When I ran out of flour tortillas once, I read the ingredients on the package. I decided I could make tortillas from flour water and salt. They were thick, gooey, not fully cooked on the center and burned on the outside. Without any guidance, I pushed forward on my quest to create my favorite dish. A burrito! It was not great, but it was handmade. I stuck with it and finally learned how to make real tortillas [a few decades later]. today I still love making tortillas and eating burritos. I stil love Michael Jackson. Especially this song.

Tune: Human Nature by Michael Jackson from Thriller

"don't stop till you get enough" photo via

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I can't believe he is gone... You know me and my love of music and food... and like you it tells a story of memories... I remember roller skating to "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough"... and I love PYT... the other Paul McCartney jam.. "Say, Say, Say".. he will be missed, but not forgotten... as I was reading your blog about burritos, I got a little chill... I was eating a burrito in my car today on the way back home and heard "Ben"...I started to cry...

Hillary's Brook said...

What a lovely post honoring MJ. I have no idea where you are or what you are up to, but hello to you. I haven't read in a while and I am so glad I just decided to. This is your good old friend Brad's sister, Hillary. I was in 6th grade at McClure when Thriller came out. My friend Jill had a huge poster of him in a pale yellow tuxedo minus the jacket with a white shirt on her wall over her bed. I wanted that poster so bad. When we were kids, I mean Brad was probably 3 years old, he stole the album Quadrophenia - by The Who. My parents were getting us the Charlie Brown Christmas album. I don't know how he got it out of the store without anyone noticing and my parents never returned it. His explanation for taking it was that he liked the sinking motorcycle on the back. The dancing at your wedding remains to me the best dancing at a wedding I have ever attended. Salute!