I remember one of the defining moments of my childhood (I was about 11 at the time) was during the hot summer, in our non air conditioned car. My mother and I were headed out to Auburn Blvd to pick up my father....who worked as a delivery driver at a now-defunct graphic arts company. Times for me were actually more stressful than they are now...I was uncomfortable with myself and everything related to me...it was pre "American Psycho..." (another defining moment in my life) and pre-nihilism...I knew I was an artist, because that is what my friends told me I was, but I didn't know what that meant other than I was somehow alienated from other children's interests and views. I knew one thing that I loved fully and truly, although not always easily explanable...was rock stars.
  While my mother pulled into the driveway of my father's place of work, the song "Killing Me Softly," came on the radio. Occasionally, my mother would quiz me about the songs we heard on the radio, such as "Who is this singing?" or "Where did this band come from?" (In the case of the Brit Invasion kids...) So as we listened to Killing Me Softly, she asked me one of my favorite questions, "What is this song about?"
  I listened to the lyrics intently...

" Telling my whole life with his words,
Killing me softly with his song ... "

And I knew, clearly, that is was about a woman looking up to her favorite idol onstage...no, not just favorite idol, but the one she loved truly madly deeply with all her heart, the one that she skipped class one day to go out and buy the new album that dropped....the one she plasters pictures up and kisses before she goes to sleep at night...the one she knows no real life man could ever live up to, but god, oh god, how she wishes she had the chance to talk with him, for five minutes even- just a friendly chat, a friendly hello, a smile in her direction, anything...anything just to be recognized, appreciated, made an individual from the thousands in the crowd waiting to be acknowledged.
" He sang as if he knew me in all my dark despair.
And then he looked right through me as if I wasn't there.
But he just came to singing, singing clear and strong."

I told my mom that it was about this, a woman who is watching a singer in concert, and I clearly remember saying that she was in love with him, but he is so far away, he looks through her like she isn't even there....but it doesn't matter, because he is there for her...even if he doesn't know it....she listens to him when she is upset...he is everywhere for her and nowhere...he is in her own mind....killing her softly....wearing her down...breaking her up....making her desperate...

And this was my first experience with acknowledging "idle worship," or knowing that these people exist for my benefit. They are not my friends, they are not my enemies, they are my IDOLS. They don't know I exist, but I know they do. I can make them anything to me- my inspirations, my models, my designs for life. They are my everything, but I am their nothing....

killing me softly....