Whitney Houston's funeral was today and although I initially had no intentions of watching it, I found myself glued to the screen for however many hours it lasted. Of course Facebook was all abuzz with people on both sides of the line debating the appropriateness of a televised funeral for a celebrity especially one whose life spiraled out of control due to drug abuse.
I'll say this much, I wasn't really a Whitney Houston fan. I know the lyrics to some of her songs because she's Whitney Houston and her songs defined music for a while. Hell, as far as I'm concerned, the Star Spangled Banner will forever be hers. Still, I never bought one of her albums and I didn't really enjoy her acting all that much. In general, I have very little sympathy for people who destroy their lives with drug abuse, but somehow watching the funeral gave me a greater appreciation for her as a person.
You can't fake love, and what I saw on the faces of those people speaking today was sincere hurt that someone they loved was gone. As they shared their stories of her as a person I began to see just how much she'd grown into her faith in God. I heard stories of how generous, giving, down to earth and loving she was. It painted a picture of someone who I'd only caught glimpses of through caricatures in the media and it made me feel guilty. It made me realize that I'd written her off as just another celebrity doing drugs and fucking her life up.
This funeral celebrated her life as a person and it showed people who that person was. Someone commented on my Facebook page that it was inappropriate and insinuated that the whole thing was a spectacle or a parade for artists to get out there and perform as if it were a follow-up Grammy show. I reject that on so many levels. To say that music was a big part of her life would be an understatement. She immersed herself in her craft and when you do that in whatever field you're in, it's only fitting to be remembered in that medium.
If I died today, my relatives and friends would sing at my funeral. Perhaps later they'd play some of my favorite songs as a memory to me. When you're godmother is Aretha Franklin, your cousin is Dionne Warwick and your "almost-like-family" include BeBe and CeCe Winans then naturally your funeral will look like a concert. Some of them were asked to sing her favorite songs, while others wanted to pay their respects in the best way they knew how. Their craft, like hers, is singing. It's how all of us express ourselves at some point or another, so it's only fitting that Stevie and Kim would alter song lyrics to honor her or Alicia Keys would play one of her songs that reminds her of Whitney. It wasn't about fame or glory, it was about love and that's what I took from the funeral.
I'm an even bigger fan now that I have a glimpse at the person. This was someone who could bring all these people together and moved them in such a way that nearly all of them were brought to tears. That is greatest love of all.
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