The moral of this story is: if a nervous breakdown beckons the best time to plan it would be towards the end of January. As well as being able to collect a mass of behavioural data about the family over the Christmas period, this would give one sufficient time for a visit to the G.P; have an initial psychiatric assessment, and then six months therapy before the psychotherapist departs for warmer climes.

So given this information, you might forgive me for thinking that I might have August off. But no, it seems from your email that an August Newsletter is still expected – hungrily anticipated even…

Having said all that here is a pic of me this August! What a pain…

Autographs

Lately there have been bucket loads of emails asking me to send signed photos. This is a misunderstanding of the purpose of this site. It is not a Fan Club. It is not a commercial enterprise. It is not funded by a record company or a product. It was started by me and is run personally by me as an experiment in communications. I was really intrigued by the idea of having a direct line of dialogue between myself and the people who have shown interest in my life and my work. I liked the idea of being able to share my thoughts in an open but non-intrusive way and to gather together like-minded people. Starting from the first monthly Newsletter in January 01 it has grown organically in response to your feedback. So far it has been a great eye opener and a wonderful source of inspiration. I would like the dialogue to continue to be meaningful. This is not to say that a Fan Club is not a desirable thing and would probably enhance the Fans Lounge section of the site. But I do not have the personal resources or desire to run it….

Over to you. Any bright ideas? Meanwhile there are still some signed archive photos available. The details are available in the Fan Lounge Mail Room.

Gladioli and Glad Rags

In September I am recording an interview for a retrospective TV documentary on The Smiths. I hope you enjoyed Morrissey at the Albert Hall. Any personal reviews that are printable? Please stick them up in chat room – then I don’t have to censor them!

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Fighting For Peace Is Like F***ing For Virginity

Scuse the Anglo Saxon but I feel strongly about this. I have been a committed Buddhist for over 25 years now. There is no such thing as a Holy War in Buddhism. War is the ultimate defeat of all that is noble and worthy in humanity. All the great freedoms that have been achieved in the world have been led and won by incredible courageous people such as Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King, Florence Nightingale, and numerous, mostly anonymous, feminists. These people put first the unassailable right of ALL people to live in dignity. They embraced and valued difference rather than being frightened of it. They did not kill people because they thought, spoke or behaved differently.

It is difficult to know the truth and be able to make informed judgements in these days of political spin. But we can take cues from people who we can see to have integrity, not only through their words but also in their behaviour. I have been reading the views of people such as Mo Mowlem, who was instrumental in the peace process in Northern Ireland, John Pilger, the war journalist, who obtained the Nobel Peace Prize for his work, and Nelson Mandela who stands apart from other world leaders as a person truly worthy of being called an International Statesman. None of these people support a war on Iraq. They expose it for what it is: a war about oil, money and a foreign policy that has complete disrespect and disregard for human rights.
Of course the people of Iraq need assistance in standing up to Saddam Hussein. But there is a huge difference between defending a moral position and acts of aggression as economic strategy. Not least the way in which it is done – a moral position is fought through dialogue and struggling to achieve mutual respect and understanding and requires far more courage than an act of war that is nothing more than school bullying in the world playground.

I don’t understand why nuclear and chemical weapons should be deemed safer in the hands of rich Western, Christian countries than in “undeveloped”, non-Christian countries. The simple truth is that these weapons are not safe in anyone’s hands. They are designed to kill and maim. They are an abomination of our creative potential as human beings, whoever is wielding them.

I am really inspired by Marianne Pearl a fellow Buddhist and member of SGI, the international Buddhist organisation that is a non-political member of the United Nations. Marianne is the young widow of Danny Pearl the American journalist who was killed by terrorists in Pakistan and whose torture and horrific death was videoed by them for the world to witness. Marianne was pregnant with their first child at the time. Her reaction to this heart wrenching personal loss was a powerful example to all of us who struggle with inexplicable loss on a personal day to day or on a global level. In an article in the World Tribune she was asked:

“Many people have been struck by how you have resisted blaming the kidnappers and instead emphasised the importance of dialogue. How have you kept this as a focus?” She replied, ”I feel a strong need to stay true to Danny’s ideals, which were centred on truth and dialogue. In the pictures of him in captivity I could see that he was not defeated. So how could I give up? I had to keep trying. The works of Daisaku Ikeda, my Buddhist teacher, have really inspired me, now more than ever. I think I have a new appreciation of his message of peace. I understood it before, but it has reached a new level. I see the courage it takes to remain focused on dialogue and understanding.”

As you can see, I don’t just wear these CND symbols as a fashion item – I mean it!

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Shrink Again

Now I’m going back to my hard-cover, hard-core reading material.