Bowie

I was twenty-five and didn't know what to do. And he smoked a lot, really a lot, lighting one after another, and listened to David Bowie. And he also managed to get married, unsuccessfully, almost for fun, and the “marriage” was falling apart, and his health was failing, and a diploma in the totalitarian art of the post-war USSR - why did he even take this topic? — sagged. I took on it, this way and that, but the topic, the topic really wasn’t mine.

And so, one spring Sunday morning, I decided that I would not go to my wife or to the library, but would take a walk and think about existence. And I walked, wearing headphones, with a springy step, under Speed ​​of Life, to the river. We have a place in Tver (I’ll check the maps later and describe it) where the Darkness forms gaps, ponds covered with duckweed, there is also a palace of pioneers and a bakery nearby, and in winter everything is white, only in the middle there is a hot stream of some kind of drainage, and above all this there is a high narrow bridge on stilts. Pure Tarkovski-Style. That’s where I was headed that day. On the way, I listened to Low in full and smoked three cigarettes. I changed the disc to Diamond Dogs, but didn’t listen to it, enjoying the sounds of the city. And when he got there, he lit a cigarette and lay down on the grass. And in the death as the last few corpses lay rotting. Empty bottles and glass were scattered at a distance, the May sun was hot and flowing down to the ground, spreading in greasy spots across the bushes and trees, awakening to life all sorts of swamp priests, bugs and little devils, nearby I lay with a backpack under my head, skinny, smoke-stained, fifty-kilogram, with pleurisy (which I didn’t know about), with otitis media, and thought that my personal Ziggy, Ivan Kranov is dead, but he was very, very good, this Kranov, and popular at that. What to do next? I didn't know, I had no idea.

I had a VHS of Truffaut's Jules and Jim in my backpack. And the wife? The wife wanted a fur coat, and gold, and castanets, and lace, and a trip to the sea. What about me? Lost interest in everything. As Austin Powers said: where did my mojo go, Dude? What about in the pond? There were a lot of frogs. They were screaming. The tram shivered behind the bushes. I turned up the volume and Big Brothers was playing. Shake it up, shake it up. Move it up, move it up. I got up, went to the bakery, bought a carton of milk and a warm, crusty bun. I had a snack on a bench. He smoked, crumpling up the empty soft camel pack. I reached the kiosk. I bought cigarettes, and there, at a nearby kiosk, replaced “Jules and Jim” with “Tender Skin.” Humbly he trudged towards his wife. She was arguing about something with her mother, with a portly middle-aged woman, it seems, about the color of the wallpaper in the hallway, or maybe... Maybe... I absolutely don’t remember. But he sat there for an hour and a half, drank tea, stole a few crumpled kisses (he left, however, an order of magnitude more), referred to the matter (invented it), and left. He left almost crying...

Here I have, fool, “Tender Skin,” Burroughs and Ballard. Who to share with? There was no, there was no one. There was only David Bowie. I listened to him constantly back then and carried several CDs in my backpack. It was getting dark. It's Outside's turn. Evening lights. Women in denim shorts. Disheveled, fragrant. They flirt openly. The heels of their high heels tap dully on the asphalt. Whores. Wild Horses. I think I“ve lost my way. I taxied to the night supermarket, took four bottles of beer. Please hide from the kiss and the bite. I’m ready. I”m deranged in the minibus. Lights of city outskirts. Empty apartment. Repair. Parents are at the dacha, the mattress is on the floor. Lantern light. Strangers when we meet. Wonder what "moondust" means? Surely, this is a slang word; it’s not for nothing that people like to write it on signs in casinos. I saw it at the Casino when I was a teenager. However, it's time to sleep. But first, Hunky Dory. And beer. Here I lie, smoke, and look at the lantern, how its light merges with the moonlight. Moonlight People. No, that's not it. Does the boombox play Life on Mars? Using Quicksand, I call my wife back: yes, I’m home, everything is fine, I’m torn between the light and dark, good night. I always fall asleep to my favorite Bewlay Brothers. The bottles are empty, the ashtray is full. I fall asleep in outerwear. Leave my shoes, and door unlocked I might just slip away. Just for the Day, Hey! Please come Away, Hey! In the morning to the first couple. There will be a lecture on the expressionists. I'll definitely go.