Missing You Never Gets Old
One year ago today, I woke on a chilly weekday morning before
dawn. Tangled in the web of a bad dream, I’d jerked up in bed and
remained in a state of wide-eyed apprehension until throwing off the covers
and surrendering to the day. Wrapped tightly in my familiar old robe, I trudged to the kitchen, propped myself up at the counter with a cup of coffee, and reached for
my phone.
After slogging through a
maddening lot of junk emails, and a couple late night texts, I surrendered to the siren call of Facebook. I scanned the first post that popped into my feed, from an old
friend from high school days. I can’t recall the exact words she used,
but she was torn to shreds as she passed along the news I never expected to hear: David Bowie was dead.
I read her post over and over. I checked the BBC and sure
enough, it was true. I cried as the shock bore into me, and I felt a pain I’m
embarrassed to say I haven’t felt for the death of even some people I actually knew.
Weird to some, I know, but the knowledge that this artist was no longer
breathing shook me to my core, that place that even my husband or my kids can’t
touch. The lush, dark place from where I grew, molded and guided by the things
around me, showing me who and what I wanted to be. The place within
myself I truly became aware of as an adolescent.
And what did a British man in his late 30s have to tell a struggling
teenager in Texas? That the perceived
weirdness and oddities I languished over in the mirror were not only okay but
should be embraced. Not that I always listened to his advice, sadly. But the
message was there.
And then, of course, there was the music.
Ample rock obituaries and tributes have been written about this
man and his influence on music and the world at large. But what I’m thinking about as I sit here listening to his final album, Black Star, released just two
days before his death, is how he still inspires me creatively.
Gary Kemp from Spandau Ballet described Bowie on Sirius XM's Volume, and he summed up my feelings quite nicely:
David
Bowie allowed people who weren’t musicians to be creative about themselves,
with themselves, and for themselves. To paint an image greater than their
boring lives and walk out onto the street like that. He gave us the license, the
validation, to be greater than we are.
This is precisely what spoke to a teenager in Dallas putting
on her Catholic school girl uniform to face her peers and what speaks to me
today, as a forty-six year old woman heading to a PTA meeting. Live
bigger, dream wilder, nurture your creativity, never be afraid to change. Life
is more than what you’re allowing yourself to live.
In trying to explain his loss to someone who isn’t a music
fan, I’ve described it as such: it’s like a favorite color is missing from the box of
crayons. Let’s call it Silverstar. You love to sit at the table in front of
the window and color the trees and sky you see through the smudgy glass.
Sometimes, you imagine it’s nighttime, and you draw the heavens. Even before creating the black background of night sky, you instinctively reach for the Silverstar crayon, but your fingers land in an empty hole between Barn Owl Gray and Timberwolf. Both nice colors, in their own right, but not Silverstar. No other color in the box has the same juxtaposition of thoughtfulness and glam, shimmer and soul. You look around the room and see all the other pictures you’ve drawn over the last decades using Silverstar and admire their tenacity.
But you will never color with Silverstar again.
Sometimes, you imagine it’s nighttime, and you draw the heavens. Even before creating the black background of night sky, you instinctively reach for the Silverstar crayon, but your fingers land in an empty hole between Barn Owl Gray and Timberwolf. Both nice colors, in their own right, but not Silverstar. No other color in the box has the same juxtaposition of thoughtfulness and glam, shimmer and soul. You look around the room and see all the other pictures you’ve drawn over the last decades using Silverstar and admire their tenacity.
But you will never color with Silverstar again.
David, I’m thankful for your ability to reach through glass,
metal, and wood into the heart of a girl who didn’t know herself. And every
time I listen to your music, I feel
your grasp on me again, reminding me to set aside the distractions and create.
Not for what it can be or who will see it, but for the sake of art itself. To release my own brand of emotion and beauty into the world that wasn’t there before.
“Someone will appreciate it,” he said. And we did.
“Someone will appreciate it,” he said. And we did.
The
moon flows on to the edges of the world because of you
Again and again And I'm awake in an age of light living it because of you
Better take care
I'm looking at the future solid as a rock because of you
Again and again
Wanna be here and I wanna be there
Living just like you, living just like me
Forever
Putting on my gloves and bury my bones in the marshland
Forever
Think about my soul but I don't need a thing just the ring of the bell in the pure clean air
And I'm running down the street of life
And I'm never gonna let you die
And I'm never ever gonna get old
- David Bowie
This is just fantastic, moving and inspirational both in remembrance of him and from your words themselves! Nice to "see" you today-always a treat when you post (even when I need tissues) ;)
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