and then there were three

There are a number of ways for one to realize he is getting old. The most painful being without doubt, loss. By the time "The dark side of the moon" came out, I was not even but a distant intention in my parents minds, I wasn't even speaking during the "Wall" tour and I did not listen to Pink Floyd until long after they had split. Somehow though, I not only felt that they "belonged" to me, but also that -in a strange, metaphysical manner- I have always been a post-modern witness of their glorious past. It was probably due to the lack of good music after the legendary 60s and 70s and their unquestionable genious, that I felt that more than re-discovering them, I somehow "deserved" them.

The only time they played a gig in a place close to me, on May 31st, 1989, I was probably celebrating my little sister's 10th birthday in our small flat in Athens, most likely completely unaware of such an event even taking place. This meant I never had the chance to see them live and given that a prohibitive number of years had passed since the days of "Wish you were here" and "Animals", I was not expecting to ever have the privilege to do so. Last Tuesday, when Rick Wright left for his own last gig in the sky, he took a lot of things with him. Among those I was not so much saddened with the irrevocable vanishing of hope for a reunion, as with the feeling that actors -no matter how insignificant- of my life's play are passing behind the curtain.

It came to me then that you may know you are getting old when your heroes are long gone, but it is at an earlier stage that you become aware of aging and this is when you no longer create new heroes to replace the ones that have departed. On Tuesday I realized I have no replacements for Pink Floyd. It has little to do with their immortal music but with their physical presence.
And you have to trust me, it is less superficial than it sounds.