The Fort Tryon Park Project (Old Songs and New Flowers)

The leaves in Fort Tryon Park had apparently huddled together to stay dry during a night of heavy rain. Nobody could figure out what time of year it was, and whether it was going to snow. The rocks, usually covered with ice at this point in the year, dripped with moss and lichen. My knees and legs felt pretty good, today. Since developing a case of "runner's knee" a few months ago, I've been doing less running, more stationary biking, and -- especially -- more elliptical-ing. What I've learned is that it's actually possible to maintain probably 90 percent of your runner's endurance (assuming you want to run say, six to eight miles at around a seven-minute pace; I'm not talking about serious race training) and at the same time heal your stupid knee and not put as much pressure on your joints, overall. All things considered I would prefer to run outside all the time (ideally near a warm ocean lol), but I'm feeling happy that I won't have to abandon running completely, as I was beginning to fear at the end of last year.  Like millions of other people, I've had David Bowie running through my head a lot this week: on my run, it was "Suffragette City." I can't really add much to what has already been said about his music, but I do remember being very intrigued and frightened by his "strangeness" in the 1970s; there was a "Space Oddity" video and some concert footage from Ziggy Stardust I saw that made an impression on me. I didn't associate him with anything "gay" per se -- although I do remember seeing him being listed in "The Book of Lists": I want to say that he and Elton John (and I think Bill Tilden or maybe Rod Laver?) were at the end of a list of "homosexuals" who had a little footnote asterisk next to their names that at the bottom of the page said "bisexual," which made it seem like the saddest of all designations. When I went to boarding school in tenth grade, my new friend Denise invited me over to her parents' house -- it was just a short walk from campus -- where her older sister was having a party. It wasn't like a public-school party with hordes of wasted kids running around; it was more sophisticated and urbane: juniors and seniors were sitting around a mid-century modern living room, drinking wine, smoking cigarettes (maybe some weed), and listening to David Bowie, specifically the greatest-hits record that everyone had back then that was just his face on the record cover. I couldn't have phrased it in these terms at the time, but I understood that David Bowie was "cool" in ways that other rock bands/acts were not (for example, the Fixx and the Police were bands I loved at the time, but I somehow knew would just be a phase.) I was a little nervous at the party because I didn't know anyone except Denise, but I felt comfortable just sitting on the (black-leather Eames) ottoman and reading the lyrics on the record sleeve. David Bowie's songs were my friends, which is how I still think about them: like many old friends, we're not as close as we used to be, and we don't need to see each other every day, but I'm always happy when they stop by. Today on the first part of my run I had a Frank Sinatra song going through my head -- I recently listened to a piece about him on "This American Life" -- so I was pretty relieved when "Suffragette City" showed up. I've never understood the appeal of Frank Sinatra, although I loved hearing about the Frank Sinatra impersonator who apparently used to put on concerts outside of his East Village apartment while his neighbor tap danced and crowds gathered. I also think that David Bowie, in some ways, was a "deconstructed" Sinatra; they were both "crooners" in a way -- think about that crazy duet between Bowie and Bing Crosby (just Google it if you don't know it) -- but Bowie had wit; even when he was at his most "heterosexual" -- like in the video to "China Girl" -- you get the sense that he's laughing at the idea of rolling around on the shoreline as the waves wash over him and his "China Girl." Or at least half-laughing, because Bowie is a master of ambiguity; like you never know exactly what he's thinking, which of course is why he'll always be considered a descendant of Andy Warhol, who made ambiguity into a religion. You might even say that David Bowie was for this reason -- ambiguity -- the bridge to so many other great bands of the 80s, like R.E.M and the Smiths and many others who effectively subverted the "macho" arena-rock aesthetic of the 1970s and wrote music that was about longing more than lust or conquest. Which makes a lot of sense if you think about what was going on in the 1980s. As usual, the park was empty in terms of people. It was just me, the phantasmagoria of flowering heather, and "Suffragette City." Earlier in the week it was "Moonage Daydream." "I'm an alligator." The rain had soaked the wall, but only half of it. I wondered what was going through the statue's mind. I would never know. The best art, I think, not only reflects us -- our dreams, our personalities, our desires -- but also and more importantly distorts our understanding of who we are, namely by showing us who we can be. A song can confirm your suspicions about what's beautiful and what's not.

And remind us that as long as we are alive, we can still flower.