You won’t find me talking about David Bowie being my favorite artist or creating my favorite music but you will find me listening to his music.
If we were to talk about it in any sort of detail I’d tell you how the first song of his I discovered without the help of my friend’s older siblings was Let’s Dance.
And then depending on who you are his death might lead to a conversation about whether it is a sign of our own mortality too.
Why?
Because when the heroes of your youth start to die at more advanced ages you know you have aged a bit.
Granted 69 isn’t particularly old it is not the same as the twenty-something who dies a tragic death at far too young an age.
But then again age is relative isn’t it?
Fifty used to sound ancient to me and now that it is only three years away it sounds…young.
Ground Control To Major Tom
It is the summer of 1988 and my girlfriend is telling me how listening to Space Oddity makes her cry.
I ask her why and she tells me the picture he paints is both romantic and sad.
She tells me to kiss her, so I do and then I smile.
I am 19 and we’re both naked.
In another moment my smile will grow bigger and I’ll do my best to listen to her tell me more about why Major Tom is important to her.
But I won’t really hear her and it won’t be until I have grown up a bit and lived that those lyrics strike me.
And in the decades that follow there will be moments where I am driving across empty desert roads or walking alone through moonlit forests that I’ll think about Major Tom.
Except I don’t think about that moment with her because all that happened in a different life time and I am living in a different world now.
And if ever my mind does drift to that moment I usually hear Don Henley singing Boys of Summer and my memories move somewhere else.
Because Major Tom and I have a different mission than the one we finished back then.
Echoes Of The People We Miss
The Shmata Queen asked me how I come up with the topics I write about and I told her I don’t use an editorial calendar.
I usually just start writing and then see where it takes me.
The idea is to start a journey and discover where I am going by figuring out what makes my heart swell and my soul sing.
Sometimes it serves me well and sometimes not so much, but I only know one way to be and that is how I live.
Maybe that is why you get posts that talk about the Echoes of The People We Miss and comments about what people see when they look in our eyes.
Sometimes I complain about not getting the sort of recognition I want for my writing and or muse about the need to do more marketing of the blog.
It is because I read about the adventures of another and I think that it might be fun to experience and let myself be bent out of shape because I want what they have.
When it comes I try to remind myself that blog envy doesn’t lead to the better places to be and to remember that you never know what goes on behind closed doors.
What you think you see might not be reality, but I also know that sometimes there is a deeper truth to what you think you see.
That sometimes you might have experienced or done enough to have that deeper insight and to know that what someone else has might be precisely what you need.
So you use that as motivation to find a way to make it happen for you and you do your best to make it a positive and not a negative in your life.
Heartbreak Is A Writer’s Friend
Sometimes I wish I could speak with my friend Mr. Whitman so that I could ask old Walt what he thinks about certain things.
Because I read his words and I find myself nodding my head, because I swear I know what he is talking about.
Take these three:
- “We were together. I forget the rest.â€
- “Resist much, obey little,” and “
- “your very flesh shall be a great poem.â€
Hell, Walt, I haven’t ever read a word about your personal life and yet I feel like I know an awful lot about it.
Maybe it is because I have lived and loved a little bit or maybe it is because we are both men.
Hard to say and maybe the only thing that matters is that his words touched me and made me think.
Maybe that is the only thing that a writer should focus upon.
That is why heartbreak can be a writer’s best friend. It is universal.
Someone will love and leave you and if you find a way to share the experience people will read it.
What About Your Best Blogging?
The sand has almost run out on this particular session so I need to find a way to try and wrap it up.
Yet there is so much to explore, investigate and share. So many thoughts to consider and think about.
As we roll into year 12 of the blogging adventure I wonder if my writing is getting better or if I have lost a step.
I read posts like Four Generations & A Wedding and think about it because the guy who said he could teach people to write more interesting posts used to get a hell of a lot more traffic than he does now.
Is it because things are different now or because I have lost a step.
Don’t know if it matters because whether my hands are full or empty I keep moving.
It is what I do.
“Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you/ That you may be my poem/ I whisper with my lips close to your ear/ I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you. Walt Whiman
First, I must be older than you because my introduction to Bowie was Fame… or possibly a Bing Crosby Christmas special when I wasn’t quite sure who he was. lol
Second, I think over time we all improve on our blogging, even if the stats don’t show it. I know I certainly write better than I did when I first started, and I’d been writing all sorts of things up to that point. Business writing is a much different animal than blogging, and I’ve gotten really good at this medium.
Third, did you only smile once that night? 🙂
When my next birthday rolls around I’ll be 47, don’t know how close or how far away we are from each other in age.
I definitely knew who Bowie was before Let’s Dance, but that was only because I would sometimes hear my friends older siblings playing some of his records.
I didn’t really start listening on my own to much of anything until I was around 12 or 13.
Anyhoo, I sure hope our writing improves with time and effort. It would be a real shame to put the energy in and not get at least that. I am pretty certain most of us see the dial move in the right direction.
I’ll be 57 on my next birthday so it’s somewhere between 9 1/2 & 10 I figure. I never was a big listener to Bowie but gave him respect for his stand against MTV and then again many years later with his performance at the Concert For New York after 9/11. That makes him a good guy in my book.
He seemed to be someone who had principles and was willing to stand for them.