When the gods are mortal

I didn’t start today well, sleep deprived and hurting, falling onto twitter to start trying to do the jobs I am supposed to do of a morning. And there, the shock that is the passing of David Bowie. It doesn’t matter how old someone is, how expected it was, how really impressive it was that they lived so long when you consider how they lived… These things amount to nothing in the shock of a loss. The death of someone you care about punches a hole in you.

David Bowie was one of my first encounters with the idea that there could be more to this life than being straight and conforming to the gender you were apparently born with. An icon for fluidity and re-invention, he made this world a good deal bigger and more interesting by being here.

I never saw him play live.

There is, this morning nothing I much else I can usefully say. But other people, who have stories to share, are sharing them – and that’s the best thing we can do for the dead, and for ourselves, famous or otherwise. Speak of them, tell their stories, carry on.