I am writing this on September 1st.
The day is sunny and cold, the kind of day best spent by the sea, when the water is bright and the waves are small and frisky, and you can walk along the empty beach breathing lung-fulls of clean salt air, and thinking about the hot coffee you will make when you get home.
I am at home, looking out onto the river - its surface furrowed by the wind and by the duck traffic. I love autumn but it makes me sad, it never used to do that, I think it must be about the passing of time, and I am surprised to find in myself what other people told me I would feel - oh but a long time ago, when I was all sun and wind and the autumn light was elsewhere.
I've just had a birthday, and while I still don't have a single grey hair, I feel older - not in a bad way, but as a kind of acknowledging or recognition of how things are.
It was a very good birthday. I went to the Rolling Stones concert at the London Astoria - only a small venue seating 1500, and if not the huge spaces best suited to the Stones, then at least an unusual chance to see them close-up.
Verdict? Fabulous. If Mick Jagger is life at 60, then roll on 60. His energy is spectacular, his body is in great shape, and there is nothing about him that is weary or cynical. The band was on stage for 2 hours, and they played like they were trying to win us over for the first time.
What it means to be older is changing in our lifetime. I don't see this as a bad thing, nor as a vain attempt to cheat time. We live twice as long as we did 400 years ago, so what are we going to do with the second half of life? Whatever the answer, giving up is now only an option, and not the only option. The exciting thing is not the benefits of botox and cosmetic surgery, but the chance to keep developing and changing. As for our bodies - if we look after them, it seems they will last us well, and much longer than we could have hoped.
So - next time you don't feel like eating properly of going to the gym - think about the future - your future, and invest in it. Investing in a healthy fit body is going to be worth a lot more than a pension plan.
Marvelling at Mick Jagger was not the only thing I did on my birthday; I finished my new book.
Yes, and at last!
There will be editorial work, but essentially it is done, and it felt like the best present I could give myself because I started thinking about it and sketching it a year ago, and it has taken a long time to happen.
You may think a year is not a long time - but like all time - a year is relative to what you put into it and get out of it. My year was very long. The hours were stretched out. Book-hours took over clock-hours.
I am very tired, but can't rest until October 5th - the day The PowerBook finishes in Rome.
Yes, today is the first day of the new rehearsals for The PowerBook, and if any of you want to see it in Paris, it will be on at Chaillot - the national theatre in Paris - from Sept 17th - 27th. We then take it to Rome for the festival there, from Oct 1st -4th. So a couple of chances if you happen to be in Europe. The cast remains the same: Fiona Shaw, Saffron Burrows, Pauline Lynch, and the ensemble players. Director Deborah Warner.
It's a strange thing, going back to the last book, when I have just finished a new one. Oh, and the new one is called LIGHTHOUSEKEEPING, and it will be published next year, but I haven't got a date yet, because we haven't even begun to do business on it.
As I think I've said - I never sell a book until it's written.
It's books everywhere this autumn for me.
My children's book, THE KING OF CAPRI is published here and in the USA and in France and Germany and Denmark this month. It's a picture book for little kids, and I think you will like it. I wrote it for my Godchild, and it's given me as much pleasure as anything. The UK and USA publisher is BLOOMSBURY (yes, same as Harry Potter, can't be bad).
Like most people I am depressed and shocked by the state of the world, two years after September 11th, and I hope we will all make time on that day to remember the dead and the grieving, and to pray positively for a better world. Prayer is worthwhile, with or without a god, because it causes us to focus and concentrate and channel our thoughts.
I think it is very important to take time to focus on the kind of world we would like to live in; we are all responsible for our world, and we can't just hand it over to politicians and terrorists - some of whom are the same people.
We can always do something to make it better - both in the small ways of our own community and our daily interaction with others, in the larger ways of campaigning and being involved with national and international issues, and in the invisible ways of thinking positively about change. Our mental state is so crucial to how we live. What we are, as well as what we do, makes a difference. If we feel apathetic and careless about the world - multiply that by millions, and governments and big business will always just do what they want. Resistance starts in our minds. Change begins as an idea.
So be strong-minded about your world. Don't give up. Don't give in.
Maybe see some of you in Paris and Rome. Until then - here's the Jewish Blessing that I love - MORE LIFE INTO A TIME WITHOUT BOUNDARIES.
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