PREFACE

I wrote my first book when I was thirty years old. Writing a book in your sixties is quite different from writing one in your thirties. I’m not currently pessimistic but I know this is the latter part of my existence; I’m getting older even though I feel madly young.

What should this book be about? I hope it will be about how I’ve evolved. I will, of course, throw in some gossip, a handful of dirt, but there won’t be any doom dust for anyone that’s reading who detests me, Caron, Jon . . . there are probably more but I’ve never been good at feuding. I used to be able to hate a little bit, but it never lasted.

I’m not a hateful person. You can keep pushing me to make me hate you but in the end you won’t be able to keep it up. The Bette Davis and Joan Crawford feud was fun to watch but who wants to be around that vibration. Oh, I used to lose my temper at the flick of a tick. Throwing framed pictures and vases down the stairs at my ex-boyfriend, Michael Dunne. Him kicking his foot through my plate-glass front door. Driving my lime-green Cortina into Jon Moss’s garage door because he was doing the dirty with a girl in his boudoir. Michael and I remain the best of friends. Jon, well, that’s another chapter. Even in the days when I lost my rag a lot, I always got over it quickly. Now I know I don’t have to do it. Like you, I am my own centre of control. I am the problem, the solution and every bit between. I am also the vast nothingness that I float in.

I walk down the street talking to myself. I try to reprogram my mind to be more positive. Over the years I’ve always had these conversations with myself but now I actively direct my mind towards a positive vibration. I chant most days but it’s easy to forget. I have to tell myself that ten minutes chanting Nam Myoho Renge Kyo is good for my soul. I was once so privy to my internal moods that I spent most of my time overreacting to everything. Now I walk onstage with confidence. I’m light, nervous in a way I never believed I could be. If the sound is bad, I deal with it patiently, but I know it’s mostly in my head. Onstage was the place where I always lost my cool. I used to throw mic packs at the monitor guy. I would walk around the stage like I’d been abandoned by Roy and Mikey. I could feel all Jon’s mistakes and his negative energy behind me. It was me against them. With Jon, there has always been unresolved trauma. I think now, though, I could handle him perfectly. He was too late to benefit from my change of mind. My change of heart.

I was told by my friend and teacher, Liliana Bellini, that when something is really important it’s best to say less or nothing. It doesn’t mean you don’t care; it means you are giving yourself space to think something else. How you think often lands harshly as a judgement of yourself or others. Lots of things are not as real as you think. I think having rigid thinking stops you truly enjoying who you are. We are given and then develop a narrative about ourselves that can hold us back or fire us through the roof. Ego can be ugly but also sexy.

I’ve learned that who you are can change but it should only change for the better. Better is a choice. Meditate and say silently:

 

Don’t think

Don’t think

Don’t think

 

You will think, of course, but play around with holding silence and try thinking stuff that elevates you. You can only understand your mind if you engage with it. I just stopped writing, closed my eyes and started slowly breathing through my nose. I said ‘I am love’ a few times. Try doing a mudra with your fingers. Look it up. Slow breathing in and out of the nose is something I started during the pandemic. My friend and sax player James Gardiner-Bateman told me about the Buteyko Method of breathing and I started googling. I watched endless videos by instructor and author Patrick McKeown. The fact that he was Irish seemed important.

I am British but equally Irish. Like that Morrissey song, ‘Irish Blood, English Heart’. Irish blood runs through me on both sides and a bit of Welsh too. I grew up in multiracial, eclectic, south-east London in the seventies. It was openly racist, which was accepted by many people. ‘Let’s all fight for the right to abuse.’ Now with the internet we no longer have to accept it and we can tell everyone. Has it changed the world completely? No. I just think we’re over-stimulated now. Pop culture is a headless-chicken free-for-all. If you hated me in the eighties and wanted to tell me, you had to write a letter. Now you just tap a keyboard and I know how you feel. Saying that, I don’t seem to have trolls. Maybe at times I have been a troll?

 

Who am I today,

Who did I used to be,

Who will I be tomorrow or the next time

that you see me.

 

I don’t think I was ever horrible, but I’m certainly much nicer than I used to be. I’m nicer to myself and I’m less reactive to behaviour that might have once triggered me. In fact, I think being less reactive has been my life’s work for the last ten years. I dip in and out of therapy all the time. People tend to look down at therapy as a self-indulgent pastime. ‘Oh, very American,’ they say. But I’ve always said you should get it before you need it. Having someone listening to you impartially and not tell you what you want to hear can be very life-affirming.

The last therapist I worked with, Dr Sarah, was in LA so it was very American and we did our sessions over Zoom during the pandemic while I was in London. I inherited Dr Sarah from my manager and friend, Paul Kemsley (PK), and his wife, Dorit. Sharing therapists is very modern.

Dr Sarah told me I was a people-pleaser, which blew my sense of punk. I’ve always thought of myself as a people-agitator. But when I started to think about it, I realised I don’t like arguing as much as I used to. I used to really enjoy arguing and being right, but now I know there is no prize for being right: what’s the point?

Growing up, I never really knew that I had the power to change my mind. But being able to change what you think is one of the healthiest things you can do. Right now, you’ll know about my war with Jon Moss and, even though I don’t like what he’s done, I don’t hate him or wish him harm.

After all my drug addictions and public car crashes, I started to get a sense of who I really was. My ex-friend, the club promoter (among other things) Philip Sallon said at the time, ‘You have all your Irish charm back. You remind me of the boy I met at fifteen.’ He said for a long time I’d lost my sense of humour. Sadly, I think the same of him now.

But it’s true, I can turn off my anger now in a way I never could before. Though I think I’ve always been very forgiving because I’ve been forgiven of many things myself. I sometimes scream out loud when I’m frustrated and Tiffany, my day-to-day manager, might think I’m attacking her but it’s never personal. I’m screaming at the universe.

My ability to forgive annoys my family. Especially my sister, Siobhan, but she finds it easy to hate people on my behalf. I don’t have a favourite sibling but if I did it would be Siobhan. We are five boys: Richard, Kevin, me, Gerald, David and then Siobhan. All the boys feel protective towards her, she’s our baby sister. Mum waited patiently for her and she is a diamond.

David Bowie used to say, ‘I’m not a great finger wagger.’ And I guess I’m the same. I have morality but it’s not overbearing. I joke that I created myself out of cardboard and glitter. And even now I very much think of myself as a work in progress.

Somewhere inside I know hatred is harmful to the self just as kindness is good for one’s own soul. I walk down the street and force myself to smile. I google how to be more fun. I want to know everyone’s star signs and I judge them accordingly. I have decided that it’s a person’s moon sign that really tells you the most about them. Morrissey is a Gemini like me, but the Scorpio moon makes him tricky. Like Mick Hucknall, another Gemini with a Scorpio moon.

It’s not a condemnation, and I laugh when people ask, ‘Is it bad to be a Scorpio?’ As a rule, a Scorpio would never ask that question. They are often annoyingly confident. Very attractive. Ask anyone their star sign, wait till they tell you and then roll your eyes. Even those who say they don’t believe in it will get flustered. I often get it wrong trying to guess someone’s star sign and I’m more willing than ever to accept that most of what I think isn’t real. I recently spent twenty minutes at a rave trying to guess a girl’s star sign. I was crap. She was a Taurus.

I use star signs as a way of understanding aspects of a person’s character. They say that Geminis live in their heads. It’s true, I think an awful lot; my mind is a supermodel. I am Gemini sun with a Cancer moon. I also have Taurus and Capricorn. I’m told this configuration stops me from being your typical flighty Gemini. Who would want to be flighty? I’ve never been the type to look over someone’s shoulder to see if anyone more important is in the room. If it’s someone handsome, that’s another story . . .

My friend Laura Fireman brought her journalist friend, Julia Kuttner, to the theatre recently to see the incredible Maureen Lipman as the Holocaust survivor, Rose. I asked Julia, ‘What’s your star sign?’

She raised her eyebrows and said, ‘You tell me, Mystic Meg.’

‘You’re Cancerian,’ I replied, and she was.

I’m surrounded by feisty Cancerian women and her attitude was familiar. Crabs are never shy and their claws are quite sharp. They protect those they love with fierce passion and they carry their home on their backs. They make friends easily but end up with too many friends. They say stuff they don’t really mean and then say it again. All hail the double-down queens. It’s a good job I love strong women.

I once had a conversation with Professor Brian Cox, the rock and roll physicist, about astrology. It wasn’t much of a conversation and his view, without taking a breath, was:‘Astrology is utter rubbish, an abomination.’ Yet, I see so much truth in it.

I warn you now that star signs will be a recurring theme in this book. PK often tells me I should stop asking everyone’s star sign. But it’s a fun conversation starter and, in a world where you can no longer ask people where they’re from, why not go deeper?

Lots of things happen in our lives and we interpret them based on what we feel about ourselves or the world. Are our lives just one huge projection? I google this stuff a lot, but the internet provides many arguments for and against everything. Only eat cheese. Never eat cheese. The internet is brilliant when it tells you what want to hear. A bit like horoscopes. Everyone loves talking about themselves. Virgo, Capricorn and Taurus are said to be the least inclined to believe in astrology, but Geminis are also meant to be cynical about it. I am deeply cynical, but the windows to optimism are always wide open.

Everything I read about Geminis seems to describe me perfectly. Except the two-faced accusation. No, not two-faced. Only one beautiful face. A Gemini can love or hate you in the same breath. It’s why I keep monsters in my life – I can hate that about you but love everything else. If I know why someone is twisted, then I can forgive. But that pain never leaves. It’s ingrained in your soul. I think pain always comes from childhood. From what the world told you about yourself.

 

Poof

Girl

Mary

Fairy

 

At school I was always called a girl. I never considered it an insult. Girls are amazing. I am surrounded by fabulous, gutsy females and I know a feisty woman is a gay’s best friend. I have been accused of being both anti-trans and misogynist. But if I support the trans community, that doesn’t mean I don’t support women. Geminis don’t take sides and I don’t need to. I want a safe planet for everyone. I want to get on with my life and let you live yours.

Affirmations are trendy in my life. I use them daily with meditation. Ten minutes when I wake up and ten minutes late at night. People think meditation requires a blank mind. But it’s impossible not to think. Try thinking loving stuff instead. Say over and over, ‘I am silent,’ and follow your breath in and out. Just closing your eyes for a few minutes can be super helpful. A chance to take a break from the relentless thoughts you have about yourself. If the narrative you have about yourself is positive, that’s wonderful. If only good thoughts are driving you forward, then God speed.

I’ve spoken to myself over and over about writing this book. I now have a contract and a deadline.

 

I love writing

I love writing

I love writing

 

Walk away from the computer and stretch. Go outside. Think about how amazing and helpful this book could be. What do I want or need to tell you?

Everything and nothing. Let’s begin.