The day David Bowie died

On the day David Bowie died, Ziggy and I rode to Stone Beach to watch the Geminid meteor showers. 

I must say the news shook us badly. Bowie, dead? It could not be true. David was special, in a kind of other worldly way, so I guess we’d grown to believe that earthly laws of physics and biology did not apply to him. Turn out we were wrong. Janine sniffled about it all day. I wouldn’t have minded a bit of a cry myself, but I was too numb for it. 

Ziggy took it hard. He kept saying how unfair it was that on the day Bowie passed away Rupert Murdoch was getting engaged to Jerry Hall. Murdoch is like, a zillion years old and he’s still frolicking about? With that woman? Ziggy used some pretty crude words and blamed God a lot. He’s got a lot of unresolved anger issues and I don’t like it when he uses profanities. Still, at least he’s stopped going so heavy on the cocaine. Or that’s what he says, but it must be at least partially true because he doesn’t act as crazy as before, just a lot angrier. 

We played all of David’s records and watched the Lazarus video on a loop. I mean, what a hero! He managed to turn his impending death into art. It’s not everyone who can do that. Ziggy said he tends to prefer the earlier stuff but that Blackstar is like an awesome last album. By evening, we were pretty depressed but we decided to go down to Stone Beach just the same. We watch the Geminid showers every year and we could not think of a better way to pay our respects. 

Obviously, as an astronaut, I have a penchant for all things stellar, but I can objectively say that the Geminids are the best light show on earth. If you like shooting stars and you haven’t seen a Geminid shower, you haven’t lived. It’s a once-a-year extravaganza, a sky full of shooting stars frolicking about as if they were on Ecstasy, so beautiful it takes your breath away. 

Janine did not want to join, she’d been drinking too much. So I drove her red Mini, the family’s wagon being once again in the garage for maintenance. Ziggy was silent in the car and I couldn’t tell what he was thinking. We’re not as close as we used to be, Ziggy and I. Since he’s come back from teaching English in Japan, he’s been drifting from one small job to another and I’m pretty sure that life’s not all hunky dory for my old friend. 

The great thing about Stone Beach at night is that it’s deserted. It’s not so busy during the day either, as its name indicates it is full of rocks and there are plenty of better beaches along the coast. But I love the lunar landscape and it’s a great setting for the Geminids. We walked down the cliff and sat on a sort of promontory, a large flat stone halfway down to the beach. It was very dark, with a thin crescent of waxing moon and only Polaris burning bright over the grey whispering expanse of the sea. The meteors would come out later, in the next hour or so, according to NASA. 

Ziggy tuned his guitar and whistled something through his teeth that I think was meant to be Aladdin Sane. Ziggy’s never been much of a singer, but boy, could he play guitar. We used to be in the same band, The Kooks, a lifetime ago. I was the singer but I didn’t last long. It was stardom on earth or being an astronaut, and I chose NASA. Looking back, I think I was lucky to have this lifelong space dream; it probably saved me from getting too deep into drugs. Definitely, without it, I would have become an alcoholic. But I had to stay clean for over two decades and that probably made all the difference to my liver. 

Still, I share Ziggy’s first spliff every year for the Geminids and I wasn’t going to say no this time, what with the sad demise of our idol and all. It must have been really strong stuff because within seconds I started to feel all relaxed and warm inside. 

“Man, I still can’t believe it,” I said. 

‘It’s like, there’s like a hole in the time-space continuum,” Ziggy said. 

I knew what he meant but I couldn’t resist being an asshole. “Really, it is more like a hole inside us,” I said. 

“Isn’t that the same?” Ziggy can be a real smartass. 

“You can’t mix up what’s inside and outside. That’s madness.”

Ziggy puffed on the spliff and no doubt would have come up with another witticism if we’d not heard footsteps coming down the dune. We turned around and the hair on my neck stood on end. By the pale light of the moon, we could just make out a tall gaunt silhouette in what seemed to be a heavy long white coat. I was too scared to move. Ziggy’s heart was beating so hard I could hear it as if it were mine. The apparition gave us a melancholy smile as he wafted past us on his way to the beach. We watched him lounge the shoreline, a luminous figure in his white redingote, until he disappeared into the night. 

Ziggy’s voice was shaking. “Tom, what was that?”

I knew what was the matter with him. He thought it was him, David, come back from the dead to join us for our yearly piss-up. Death plays these tricks on the living. When my father died, I could not sleep for a month because I thought he was hiding in the cupboard in my room. Go figure. 

“Just some guy who’s come to watch the show,” I said. “Just like us.”

“Sure – dressed in a 17^th century nobleman’s costume? Maybe he thought this was the Venice Festival?” 

“Well, it takes all sorts.” It wasn’t the time to mention it, but Ziggy’s appearance is not what you’d call conservative either. 

We smoked another spliff. Ziggy seemed to feel better after that, so we moved down to the beach. The show was about to start; the horizon all a shimmer in prelude. I was so excited that I couldn’t help telling Ziggy again about the science behind the Geminids. Every year, the Earth crosses the orbital path of asteroid 3200 Phaethon, a mysterious rock comet with a trajectory that brings it closer to the sun than any other known asteroid. The heat causes Phaethon to crack and shed rocks that crash into the Earth’s upper atmosphere. The ensuing debris vaporizes into the Geminid’s lightshow.

I offer this little-known fact every year, so by now even Ziggy’s drug-addled brains must have retained the information, but he still nodded amiably.

“Didn’t you say once that Bowie’s got his own asteroid?”

He does. Davidbowie 342843, between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.  In winter, you can only see it in the southern hemisphere, between the constellations of Sagittarius and Scorpio. And you need a telescope. Still, it’s nice to think that our David’s got his own little piece of the sky. Knowing him, the fact that it’s not visible to the naked eye will enhance its attraction as a new home. He’s always been a tad elusive. 

Like this business of not telling us he was dying. I can understand that he couldn’t give everything away, but to us? I can’t fathom that one. Me, when I get as much as the sniffles, everyone knows about it. And Ziggy is even worse. You should have heard him when he got that prostate cancer scare two years ago. It was like Armageddon and Apocalypse Now all rolled in one. Turned out to be just a stone, because he’s been messing with his kidneys for too long. Still, I don’t blame him, I was worried too.  He’s like my little brother, Ziggy is, and nobody wants a younger sibling to be facing death. It’s unnatural. 

We sat down to open the bottle of bubbly. Before I could even reach for the cork, a weird mechanical screech made Ziggy jump two feet in the air, screaming his ass off. The noise sounded like a litter of kittens on helium and emanated from some indistinguishable object on the beach. I took off my headlight and directed it at the thing. It was a garden gnome, I informed Ziggy. A blue, plastic, thrown-away garden gnome. 

“It’s the Laughing Gnome!” 

“People like to have all sorts of things in their gardens these days.” But I could tell Ziggy was spooked, so I threw the thing away, into the darkness, where we could not see it anymore. The manic laugh redoubled then stopped. All we could hear was the sea. 

The cork came out with a pop just as the first pair of shooting stars zoomed across the sky. The show had started and it was the best we’d seen to date. They say the Geminids are getting more intense every year, they don’t know why, global warming, maybe. A scary thought, but it sure was pretty. 

And the best thing was that it went on for hours. Ziggy was alternating playing guitar and rolling spliffs, without taking his eyes off the stars. We got pretty spaced out. At one point, he switched to cocaine. I turned around because he’d been quiet for a while and there he was, snorting a huge line. Silly fool. But I understood. So much so that I didn’t say no when he passed on the mirror and the rolled-up note. It’s not every day that David Bowie dies. 

The shower calmed down. A few playful stars were still chasing each other across the firmament. The sky was shimmering gold and the sea bathed in silver, as if a thin layer of stardust had been spread onto its surface. You could see quite clearly all the way to the horizon. It wasn’t dawn yet but it looked like it. Far out at sea, a bench of fish somersaulted a few times over the waves. Ziggy swore they were dolphins, but I don’t know. We were arguing about it, in that non-aggressive way you have after a lot of dope, when we saw the clown. 

He was dressed in an outlandish costume, silvery white, adorned with feathers and crowned by a tall oblong hat like clowns used to wear when I was a kid. He lounged the dark line of the falling tide, his eyes fixed straight ahead. A gigantic hound with a studded collar shining in the dark gambolled at his side. The man in the long white coat brought the rear. He looked slightly the worse for wear after the sleepless night, but still absurdly distinguished-looking. 

“Fuuuuck,” Ziggy said. 

The monstrous dog left his master’s side to go pick up some plastic object half-buried in the sand – it was the laughing gnome. The clown bent down to pat the dog and gently prised the garden ornament from its fangs. 

“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God,” Ziggy was freaking out. That’s usually the way it ends with him. I’d have to break up the party soon. 

            Not that I liked the look of things either. It was - spooky, there’s no other word for it. I’m not as highly strung as Ziggy, some have called me a space cadet in my time, but even I could see that all these creatures were emanations of Bowie’s songs. 

It was probably just the side effects of the cocaine. When you looked at it scientifically, it was all very easy to explain. The two freaks were Bowie fans like us, who’d come to the beach to pay their respects. The dog was just a dog. They stared at us and walked by. 

            “Oooooooh,” Ziggy moaned, his head in his hands. 

            “It’s OK,” I said. 

            “OK? What do you mean, OK? Can’t you see what’s going on here? He’s calling us back!”

            “Calling who back?”

            “Well, why do you think we’re all here on this beach? Tonight of all night?”

            “We came to watch the Geminid showers.”

            “Yeah, right. And where are they now all your pretty stars? Burnt to ashes, that’s where.”

            “Actually, scientifically speaking…”

            “Actually nothing.” He turned to look at the freaks, who’d sat down a bit further up the beach and were trying to start a campfire. A serrated noise rose through the mist, I thought at first it was the gnome’s twin, but it was only Ziggy chuckling. 

            “What?”

            “That clown, it just came to me.”

            “Oh, forget it.”

            “No, but that clown? Do you know who he is? Really, do you know?”

            “I give up.”

            “It’s you when you’re older!  Major Tom! It’s only now I get it!”

            I stole a glance at the clown. No resemblance whatsoever, of course. 

            “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Let’s go if you’re going to be like that.” 

            But Ziggy was rolling in the sand, shaking with laughter. “It’s you! Just older. Actually, it’s you now, when you think about it.”

            “Right.”

            He heaved himself on his hands and knees and managed to reach the vertical. 

            “Where are you going?”

            “To meet your older and more mature self.”

            Poor Ziggy. He’s never fully recovered from that breakdown he had when he left the band. He’s not enjoying getting old. None of us are, of course, but he is so hung up on memories of his younger self, he just can’t move on. 

            But then again, what I have done with my life lately? A space walk or two, and then back to earth for, what, over two decades now. Grounded. With Janine, who’s losing a little bit more of her spark with every Botox injection, Janine with her long blond hair cut in a bob, who doesn’t know what to do with herself now the kids have gone. Not a champion at reinventing herself, my Janine. 

            We met in London in the late seventies, when the world was still young and free. Her eyes were blue and shone likes stars. The only time I experienced that awe again was when I watched Planet Earth from space. Now, when I look in Janine’s eyes, I see fear. Her mother is in a home, she’s got Alzheimer and doesn’t recognise her children. Janice is convinced she’ll end like her. 

            And then there’s Hermione. Beautiful Hermione, tender Hermione, whom I am trying to forget for Janine’s sake. Trying, but failing. I’m thinking that it must be love. But nothing good will come of it, so late in life. 

            Lucky David. He went out like a star, he’s free now. Free from the fear. He’ll never be ugly and he’ll never be very old. 

            I started to sob, fat wet tears that melted in the sea mist, feeling very sorry for myself. I’ve loved all I needed loving, I thought. So what am I waiting for?

            David Bowie’s brother was schizophrenic. He killed himself by jumping under a train. Death by drowning has got to be sweeter. 

            But at least I’m not Ziggy, who believes that Bowie made us. We all had our inner Bowie; he meant something different to each of us and when he died, it was like a part of us died. From there to imagine that we were his creatures, that we were, so to speak, inside his mind, well, only an old cracked-up cokehead could come up with that. 

            I glanced at Ziggy, who was sitting with his new friends, the clown, the thin white duke and the garden gnome, guarded by the hound from hell. He was playing guitar and they were singing Song from a Free Festival. 

            Man, that’s going back some. Before my time, even. For some reason, that cheered me up. I went to join the freaks’ singsong. They needed a good singer. 

            Because if there’s one thing that Bowie taught us, it is that life presents us with endless possibilities to be heroic, for a minute or for a day. All of us, even old clowns like me. Until the very last moment. 

            Over the horizon, where a thin blue line heralds the promise of a new dawn, a single star still twinkles. 

Bye-bye, Space Boy. 

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