One of the last Gentlemen (So Long, Marianne).

I was 5-6 years old and it was summertime. The weather in Balsareny was hot, and I used to spend my afternoons at my dad's bedroom, learning how to write in a typing machine and reading books that were too big for someone of my age. 

My dad was always smoking on his bedroom, and listening to music. Pink Floyd, Bowie, Velvet Underground, Vangelis or Leonard Cohen, those were some of the tunes that you could hear inside that room. I didn't understand a word of what those people were singing, but I was fascinated with that sounds, that music.  

"What music do you wanna listen to now, Libertad?", he used to ask me from time to time, when one of those records where finished. "I wanna listen to that man that sings from the Moon", I answered referring to Bowie, "Or that one about Marianne". 

"So long, Marianne" was the first song in English that I ever learned. At the end of that summer, when I was going back to Algeciras, he gave me a cassette with a copy of "Songs by Leonard Cohen" and, on side b, "Space Oddity" by David Bowie. I think I still have that cassette back in Algeciras.  I want to believe that, at that moment, that man who was my father started to get interested in me because of this little things.

This morning, we woke up with the news that Leonard Cohen has died at 82. Even if I understand that this would happen sooner or later, I feel sad about him leaving us. 2016 took lots of my idols from my childhood and life in general. Now, exactly10 months after the departure of David Bowie, another big poet and musician leave us in this world, which is a little bit colder today. 

Hope you will travel through the stars and find again Marianne, Mr Cohen. One of the last Gentlemen. 

Traducción: Se ha marchado uno de los últimos caballeros. Gracias por todo, Leonard.