1 00:00:08,320 --> 00:00:11,700 Hey, humans. How's it going? Susan, Ruth here. Thanks. 2 00:00:11,700 --> 00:00:14,660 Listening to another episode of Hey Human Podcast. 3 00:00:15,570 --> 00:00:17,900 This is episode 360, 4 00:00:18,480 --> 00:00:20,940 and I have a conversation with Peter Clothier. 5 00:00:21,750 --> 00:00:26,540 Peter is a world-renowned art critic, a practicing Buddhist, a professor, 6 00:00:26,600 --> 00:00:27,940 an ex-Pat Englishman, 7 00:00:28,920 --> 00:00:33,580 and a celebrated and well-known author. His most recent book, dear Harry, 8 00:00:33,580 --> 00:00:36,700 letters to my father touches on quote, 9 00:00:36,700 --> 00:00:40,700 everything from his loss of Christian faith, intimate matters, 10 00:00:41,000 --> 00:00:45,300 and the inevitability of aging and death. Peter's dad, Harry, 11 00:00:45,440 --> 00:00:46,900 was an Anglican minister. 12 00:00:48,560 --> 00:00:50,740 We talk about Peter's own role as a father, 13 00:00:50,950 --> 00:00:54,940 world War II meditation and intimacy writing art, 14 00:00:55,680 --> 00:00:59,620 and how he's still open to learning about himself after more than eight decades 15 00:00:59,840 --> 00:01:04,140 on the planet. Really enjoyable conversation. Really interesting. 16 00:01:05,300 --> 00:01:08,780 I think you're gonna get a lot out of this one. Check out, hey, 17 00:01:08,780 --> 00:01:13,620 human podcast.com for links. And to learn more about my guests in the show, 18 00:01:13,990 --> 00:01:15,580 check out Susan ruth.com. 19 00:01:15,580 --> 00:01:18,380 To learn more about me and my other artistic endeavors, 20 00:01:18,680 --> 00:01:22,380 follow Susan Ruth and hey, human podcast on social media. 21 00:01:23,010 --> 00:01:26,340 Find my albums on Apple Music, or wherever you get your music. 22 00:01:26,890 --> 00:01:30,620 Look for all I ever wanted was everything as my most recent record. 23 00:01:31,200 --> 00:01:35,900 And check out my relationships and sex show with sexologist and healthcare 24 00:01:35,900 --> 00:01:40,340 practitioner, Amara Edelman. It's on YouTube, called Are We There Yet? 25 00:01:40,340 --> 00:01:43,900 Podcast show rate, review, and subscribe to, Hey, 26 00:01:43,900 --> 00:01:47,140 human podcast on iTunes or wherever you get your podcast. 27 00:01:48,200 --> 00:01:51,260 And thank you for listening. Thanks for sharing. 28 00:01:51,280 --> 00:01:56,060 Thanks for telling people about the show. I really appreciate it. 29 00:01:56,470 --> 00:01:57,380 Email me, Susan. 30 00:01:57,760 --> 00:02:02,500 Hey human podcast.com for any old reason at all and 31 00:02:03,090 --> 00:02:07,300 take care of yourselves. Be love, be kind, lift each other up. 32 00:02:08,240 --> 00:02:12,860 And here we go. Peter Cloth, welcome to Hey, human. 33 00:02:13,470 --> 00:02:14,303 Thank you. 34 00:02:14,550 --> 00:02:15,680 It's a pleasure to have you. 35 00:02:16,310 --> 00:02:17,480 It's a pleasure to be here. 36 00:02:18,060 --> 00:02:21,480 And our mutual friend Leah, suggested that we chat. 37 00:02:22,100 --> 00:02:22,540 Yes. 38 00:02:22,540 --> 00:02:24,000 I'm trying to get her on the show as well. 39 00:02:24,320 --> 00:02:27,520 . Oh, good. Uh, I haven't seen her for a little while. 40 00:02:28,000 --> 00:02:31,040 I have been a strange kind of interim place myself. 41 00:02:31,460 --> 00:02:34,000 My wife has been very sick for a few months now, 42 00:02:35,020 --> 00:02:37,720 and that's been taking up a lot of our time and energy. 43 00:02:37,860 --> 00:02:42,490 So we're hoping that, uh, she's turning the corner now. 44 00:02:42,980 --> 00:02:47,160 Wonderful. Wonder. Well, I wish good health. 45 00:02:47,770 --> 00:02:48,603 Thank you. 46 00:02:48,910 --> 00:02:52,440 Yeah, absolutely. It's gotta be tricky. I mean, 47 00:02:52,460 --> 00:02:54,840 you had mentioned before we started recording that, 48 00:02:55,430 --> 00:02:58,560 that you two have been together for quite a long, long, long time. 49 00:02:58,820 --> 00:02:59,820 And it Yeah. 50 00:03:00,290 --> 00:03:05,180 Well the same 54 years that we've been living on the Hill, actually, we, 51 00:03:05,240 --> 00:03:09,300 uh, got that first little house on Clayton, um, 54 years ago. 52 00:03:09,300 --> 00:03:11,420 That was the first time we moved in together. 53 00:03:12,440 --> 00:03:13,420 How was that adjustment? 54 00:03:14,530 --> 00:03:19,030 Uh, that was pretty good. We had both been married before, so, you know, 55 00:03:19,030 --> 00:03:23,070 there were a lot of initial problems in, in, uh, I had two, 56 00:03:23,250 --> 00:03:28,110 two sons and, uh, I still have two sons as a matter of fact. 57 00:03:28,490 --> 00:03:30,830 And so that was, you know, it took some adjustment. 58 00:03:31,500 --> 00:03:36,210 They went off to live in Iowa with their mother, which was quite difficult. 59 00:03:36,590 --> 00:03:39,810 So then we had a huge earthquake the first year we lived there, 60 00:03:40,890 --> 00:03:44,010 1971, the Sylmar earthquake, you know, 61 00:03:44,010 --> 00:03:45,810 it was six o'clock in the morning or something. 62 00:03:46,270 --> 00:03:50,530 We all rushed down into the street and we discovered that virtually all our, 63 00:03:50,550 --> 00:03:51,890 our neighbors were gay. 64 00:03:53,740 --> 00:03:56,160 It was a strange moment. 65 00:03:57,440 --> 00:03:59,200 . That's hilarious. 66 00:03:59,980 --> 00:04:03,040 We were welcomed there by our community because, uh, 67 00:04:03,420 --> 00:04:07,360 we were a little outside the norm cuz we were living in sin, which was, 68 00:04:07,580 --> 00:04:11,040 you know, not particularly common in those days. 69 00:04:11,380 --> 00:04:15,760 So they thought we were, uh, come Kendrick. 70 00:04:15,760 --> 00:04:16,460 Kindred. 71 00:04:16,460 --> 00:04:17,680 Bit outsider too. 72 00:04:18,740 --> 00:04:21,080 What's a little sin among, amongst friends? 73 00:04:21,540 --> 00:04:23,560 Yes. Well, we enjoyed it. . 74 00:04:23,950 --> 00:04:25,640 Tell me about where you grew up. 75 00:04:25,990 --> 00:04:30,280 Well, I grew up, uh, in England. I was born up in the north in Newcastle, 76 00:04:31,330 --> 00:04:36,240 which makes me a Jordy, which is, uh, it's rather like being a cockney. 77 00:04:36,340 --> 00:04:40,880 But, uh, instead of being born in the, in the sound of Bob's, 78 00:04:40,880 --> 00:04:44,520 you're born Ont side in Newcastle, 79 00:04:45,270 --> 00:04:47,400 I've always been very proud of being a Geordie, 80 00:04:47,400 --> 00:04:51,720 but I only lived there for a year and a half of my life. And, uh, 81 00:04:51,780 --> 00:04:55,440 my parents moved south, uh, from my father's health to the Midlands. 82 00:04:56,020 --> 00:05:00,400 He was a parish priest. So he had, uh, several different parishes there. 83 00:05:01,180 --> 00:05:02,360 And the one that, uh, 84 00:05:02,400 --> 00:05:05,440 I spent most of my childhood years in was called . 85 00:05:06,320 --> 00:05:09,820 We lived there for a number of years, including the war years. 86 00:05:10,360 --> 00:05:13,940 We were there from 1936 to 45. And. 87 00:05:14,200 --> 00:05:16,100 Do you have strong memories of that time? 88 00:05:16,650 --> 00:05:21,340 Very strong, yes. My memories are mostly around the people who, 89 00:05:21,520 --> 00:05:24,180 who came to live in our house. We had a very big old, uh, 90 00:05:24,180 --> 00:05:27,700 Victorian rectory and with lots of rooms, 91 00:05:28,240 --> 00:05:33,060 and we had a lot of people staying in our house. Um, uh, 92 00:05:33,060 --> 00:05:37,420 people from the Air, air Force base down below. And, uh, 93 00:05:37,420 --> 00:05:39,300 some naval people from time to time. 94 00:05:40,400 --> 00:05:43,700 But the mo remember what the ones I remember the most are the Blecher girls. 95 00:05:44,650 --> 00:05:49,460 It's the place where they took the enigma machine when 96 00:05:49,460 --> 00:05:53,300 they stole the, uh, enigma machine from, I think from a German submarine. 97 00:05:53,960 --> 00:05:58,780 And it became the source of a huge amount of intelligence 98 00:05:58,800 --> 00:05:59,633 during the war. 99 00:06:00,880 --> 00:06:04,020 And the Bletchley girls were the young women, 100 00:06:05,200 --> 00:06:09,130 very smart young women who went to work there for, 101 00:06:09,190 --> 00:06:14,050 mostly for the, uh, uh, kind star men. Like people like, um, 102 00:06:14,160 --> 00:06:18,970 touring, Alan Touring and others, uh, who were the, 103 00:06:19,350 --> 00:06:24,250 you know, big wigs of the place. Sure. But the girls are, you know, 104 00:06:24,380 --> 00:06:28,970 there was even a TV series about them at one point. And, uh, 105 00:06:29,030 --> 00:06:33,930 so they, they, we had three of them living in our house. They were a very, 106 00:06:34,280 --> 00:06:38,130 very powerful presence. And then also during the war, 107 00:06:38,510 --> 00:06:40,010 during the Blitz in London, 108 00:06:41,230 --> 00:06:46,090 the East Enders were streaming out of London to get away from 109 00:06:46,090 --> 00:06:50,850 the bombs. Absolutely terrified, terrorized people. 110 00:06:51,860 --> 00:06:54,720 And they would come to the village, they'd come and trains and buses. 111 00:06:55,540 --> 00:06:58,880 We would put them up as a kind of way station, put them up in, um, 112 00:06:59,300 --> 00:07:02,800 our apple basement when we kept our apples and potatoes and things. 113 00:07:02,940 --> 00:07:05,720 And we had rows of them sleeping down in the basement. 114 00:07:07,060 --> 00:07:10,000 And I remember their fear very clearly. And, uh, 115 00:07:10,980 --> 00:07:15,530 my father trying to calm them down. So I, 116 00:07:15,690 --> 00:07:20,610 I do have a lot of more memory. We had bombers fall crossed by German bombers, 117 00:07:20,740 --> 00:07:25,010 would sometimes overfly London and have some of their load left. 118 00:07:25,590 --> 00:07:28,290 Uh, so just to jettison their load, 119 00:07:28,320 --> 00:07:31,610 they would drop them our village to lighten, 120 00:07:32,120 --> 00:07:35,930 lighten themselves up to get back to Germany. Uh, 121 00:07:35,950 --> 00:07:40,050 so I remember that the farms falling and, uh, 122 00:07:40,050 --> 00:07:43,330 we had a massive Schmidt crash land in the farmer's field next to us. 123 00:07:43,390 --> 00:07:45,290 So it was a lot of, for me, 124 00:07:45,310 --> 00:07:49,530 the war was kind of a exciting hood experience. 125 00:07:51,110 --> 00:07:55,290 Uh, although, you know, I, I realized of course, 126 00:07:55,350 --> 00:07:57,650 how serious it was and, and, uh, 127 00:07:59,070 --> 00:08:02,170 how hard it was on, on the British people at the time. 128 00:08:02,990 --> 00:08:07,970 As, uh, a child from the parish. And having your, your parents, 129 00:08:08,000 --> 00:08:11,260 obviously that's a status position, 130 00:08:11,660 --> 00:08:13,780 although it's not a rich position, generally. 131 00:08:14,440 --> 00:08:18,380 Did you feel the pangs of hunger and the rationing that was going on, 132 00:08:18,440 --> 00:08:20,380 or because you were caring for other people, 133 00:08:21,640 --> 00:08:23,660 did that not really hit you as hard? 134 00:08:24,360 --> 00:08:28,500 Not as hard maybe because, um, we had ration books, of course, 135 00:08:29,200 --> 00:08:32,260 and with all these people living in our house, uh, 136 00:08:32,260 --> 00:08:35,860 they pulled the ration books and everyone had gave their ration books to my 137 00:08:35,860 --> 00:08:38,780 mother. So she was able to use, uh, 138 00:08:38,780 --> 00:08:42,380 quite a number of ration books to put together our meals. So we, 139 00:08:42,480 --> 00:08:46,620 we pretty well, I don't remember ever being hungry during the war. 140 00:08:48,200 --> 00:08:51,480 I remember missing things like sugar, chocolate. 141 00:08:52,010 --> 00:08:54,000 Sugar, nylon, yeah. 142 00:08:54,360 --> 00:08:55,580 Nylon. It was, um, 143 00:08:57,220 --> 00:09:01,840 we had a sweet shop down in the village, and there were, 144 00:09:02,060 --> 00:09:04,840 uh, the suites were very, very short supply. 145 00:09:05,970 --> 00:09:10,390 We did really extraordinarily well. We had great Christmases, 146 00:09:10,560 --> 00:09:13,350 great feasts and, and, um, 147 00:09:15,370 --> 00:09:19,070 yeah, for us in the vicarage, in, 148 00:09:19,090 --> 00:09:20,590 in many ways it was a good time. 149 00:09:21,790 --> 00:09:26,530 Did you feel a part of everything going on in that? 150 00:09:27,610 --> 00:09:30,410 I think for some kids growing up in situations like that, 151 00:09:30,800 --> 00:09:34,170 when their parents are being pulled in a lot of different directions and caring 152 00:09:34,330 --> 00:09:37,250 for other people's children and making sure other people are okay, 153 00:09:37,790 --> 00:09:40,370 did you have a sense of longing for that attention? 154 00:09:40,590 --> 00:09:44,090 Or were you in with everybody and It was okay. 155 00:09:45,830 --> 00:09:50,090 At home? I was, you know, we were certain, while I was still at home, 156 00:09:50,350 --> 00:09:54,330 we were certainly a part of everything because we had the BBC news, 157 00:09:55,610 --> 00:09:58,640 which was, you know, the center of, uh, 158 00:09:58,660 --> 00:10:03,120 of attention in the house at six o'clock every night, you know, big Ben. 159 00:10:03,940 --> 00:10:05,120 And, and, um, 160 00:10:05,140 --> 00:10:08,400 the six o'clock news would start and we would all be gathered around the radio. 161 00:10:09,140 --> 00:10:12,520 So in that sense, I did feel connected with what was going on, 162 00:10:13,950 --> 00:10:18,050 but then I was sent away to school at the age of six, seven, 163 00:10:18,620 --> 00:10:21,810 can't remember exactly, I always say six, but I think I'm exaggerating. 164 00:10:22,990 --> 00:10:26,490 My parents, my father particularly felt that this, 165 00:10:26,610 --> 00:10:30,290 I would get a better education this way and that, uh, 166 00:10:30,810 --> 00:10:35,730 I would perhaps be safer in, in a sense. So I was sent off to school at, 167 00:10:35,990 --> 00:10:39,810 at, um, the age of six, and the school was, um, 168 00:10:40,960 --> 00:10:44,840 a long way up north in, in Ambleside in the, in the, uh, lake district. 169 00:10:46,220 --> 00:10:50,200 And that started, you know, I was away for 12 years. 170 00:10:52,620 --> 00:10:57,160 So, um, we were, you know, we had two weeks at Christmas, two weeks at Easter, 171 00:10:57,340 --> 00:10:58,600 and four weeks in the summer. 172 00:10:59,420 --> 00:11:03,520 And that was the full amount of time I spent at home. So in that sense, 173 00:11:03,740 --> 00:11:05,880 to answer your question, I did feel, 174 00:11:06,280 --> 00:11:09,920 I did feel alienated separated from, from the family. 175 00:11:11,160 --> 00:11:13,120 I imagine every time you came home for holiday, 176 00:11:14,050 --> 00:11:16,920 these were strangers moving about. How would, 177 00:11:17,100 --> 00:11:19,040 how do you connect with people that you, 178 00:11:19,470 --> 00:11:23,760 when you're being really raised by your fellow school children and the teachers 179 00:11:23,860 --> 00:11:25,440 and things, how do, how do you. 180 00:11:26,350 --> 00:11:30,640 Well, by that time, by the time I was sent away, the school, uh, was, uh, 181 00:11:32,020 --> 00:11:35,820 the end of the war was approaching. So, uh, 182 00:11:35,820 --> 00:11:38,860 we didn't have so many strangers living with us, 183 00:11:38,880 --> 00:11:42,780 and I didn't have the same kind of connection with them. So it was a, 184 00:11:42,780 --> 00:11:43,940 it was a whole different experience. 185 00:11:44,180 --> 00:11:48,140 I meant the strangers of your own family being away from them and coming back 186 00:11:48,140 --> 00:11:49,060 and trying to integrate. 187 00:11:49,850 --> 00:11:53,220 Yeah, it is a strange, and I, I think personally, 188 00:11:53,520 --> 00:11:57,630 and I write about this a lot in the, in the book, it's called Dear Harry, 189 00:11:58,410 --> 00:12:00,510 and the subtitle is Letters to my Father. 190 00:12:01,330 --> 00:12:04,950 And it was written many years after my father's death. 191 00:12:06,350 --> 00:12:11,180 And, uh, this is in, in the context of what we're talking about now. You know, 192 00:12:11,260 --> 00:12:15,860 I, I did feel disconnected from, from my family and, and, uh, 193 00:12:16,520 --> 00:12:20,620 as soon as I left England, we can come back over this. Soon as I left England, 194 00:12:21,080 --> 00:12:25,380 uh, right after my Cambridge years, I started, I first went to Germany, 195 00:12:25,410 --> 00:12:29,940 then to Canada, and then to Iowa, and then to Southern California. 196 00:12:30,160 --> 00:12:35,100 So we, I got further and further away from my family in a sense. And, 197 00:12:35,120 --> 00:12:39,460 uh, these letters that I wrote were an attempt to, to reconnect with him. 198 00:12:40,840 --> 00:12:44,030 First of all, I started out thinking, well, I wanted to get in, 199 00:12:44,090 --> 00:12:44,923 get to know him better. 200 00:12:45,770 --> 00:12:48,510 And halfway through I realized that wasn't what I wanted at all. 201 00:12:48,620 --> 00:12:53,420 What I wanted was for him to know me better. And, uh, 202 00:12:53,440 --> 00:12:57,660 so that was, that was it. But is, you know, it is, 203 00:12:59,110 --> 00:13:00,480 it's about trying to, 204 00:13:03,580 --> 00:13:08,480 to remember things about my father and things about our 205 00:13:08,480 --> 00:13:13,000 relationship that were meaningful. And that really shaped my life. 206 00:13:14,400 --> 00:13:18,460 And some of which I, I only fully understood in retrospect. 207 00:13:19,360 --> 00:13:23,620 One story that I remembered about my father was, um, 208 00:13:24,760 --> 00:13:29,380 the skipping rope. I, when I was, 209 00:13:29,980 --> 00:13:34,900 I guess five, five years old, uh, they sent, uh, 210 00:13:34,900 --> 00:13:39,420 me and my sister to dancing classes in, in a little town nearby. 211 00:13:39,760 --> 00:13:44,700 It was thought that time that dancing classes were good for posture and, 212 00:13:44,720 --> 00:13:49,240 and all those things. Um, uh, we, 213 00:13:49,420 --> 00:13:54,200 we went to dancing classes and one of the things that happened in 214 00:13:54,200 --> 00:13:58,520 dancing classes were, were, was that we played, was skipping ropes. 215 00:13:58,820 --> 00:14:03,600 And every time skipping rope, um, uh, was produced, little Peter would, how 216 00:14:05,450 --> 00:14:06,730 I was so, so scared. 217 00:14:09,250 --> 00:14:13,930 And my father one day hearing this, 218 00:14:15,110 --> 00:14:19,010 he called me into his study one day being called into my father's study, was a, 219 00:14:19,030 --> 00:14:21,900 was a, was a big event, you know, 220 00:14:21,900 --> 00:14:26,820 that was a little five year old boy and my father and his caic and, and, and, 221 00:14:27,440 --> 00:14:31,940 and dog collar. And, you know, in many ways he was, 222 00:14:32,080 --> 00:14:33,900 he was kind of a God figure to me, 223 00:14:33,900 --> 00:14:37,900 because there he was in church every Sunday standing up and talking to God. 224 00:14:39,970 --> 00:14:43,430 So, uh, to be called into, into his study was, was a, 225 00:14:44,230 --> 00:14:48,820 a big and rather intimidating moment. And I, 226 00:14:48,980 --> 00:14:50,420 I went into the study and, 227 00:14:50,440 --> 00:14:54,780 and there he was sitting with in his cassock with a skipping rope on his lab. 228 00:14:57,400 --> 00:15:01,900 And he told me the story, I should back up a little bit. 229 00:15:02,360 --> 00:15:05,460 He had studied psychology at Cambridge in the 1920s, 230 00:15:06,430 --> 00:15:09,420 which is an very early period in, in psychology. 231 00:15:10,480 --> 00:15:13,420 But he knew about Freud and young, and he'd made his studies. 232 00:15:13,640 --> 00:15:14,900 He was very impressed by that. 233 00:15:15,560 --> 00:15:18,820 And he was something of an amateur psychologist himself. 234 00:15:20,080 --> 00:15:23,610 But anyway, he, uh, told me, 235 00:15:23,750 --> 00:15:26,710 he put the skipping rod around my neck, 236 00:15:27,820 --> 00:15:31,610 and he told me the story of my birth, how I'd been born, 237 00:15:31,610 --> 00:15:34,450 with the umbilical cord tied around my neck. I was a blue baby, 238 00:15:36,070 --> 00:15:40,370 and I only survived thanks to the midwife who came along with a pair of scissors 239 00:15:40,370 --> 00:15:43,130 and snapped the cord away and, and, um, 240 00:15:43,560 --> 00:15:47,530 gave me a good slap on the behind and made me cry. And that's, uh, you know, 241 00:15:49,190 --> 00:15:50,410 but he told me this story, 242 00:15:50,550 --> 00:15:55,410 he put the rope around my neck and he tightened it very slightly, very gently, 243 00:15:55,880 --> 00:15:59,050 telling me this story. And he said at the end, 244 00:15:59,070 --> 00:16:03,630 you don't have to be scared of skipping ropes anymore. Which was pretty amazing. 245 00:16:04,510 --> 00:16:07,710 I mean, this was 19 43, 19 44, 246 00:16:09,420 --> 00:16:13,720 and very, you know, very much in advance of his time. So this kind of 247 00:16:15,360 --> 00:16:20,150 treatment is, uh, is, is known and acknowledged today, 248 00:16:20,290 --> 00:16:23,470 but, but it's, it is a treatment that's fairly frequently practiced. 249 00:16:23,650 --> 00:16:25,850 But back in those days, 250 00:16:26,990 --> 00:16:30,450 it was quite extraordinarily perceptive of him to, 251 00:16:30,790 --> 00:16:32,290 and daring of him to do that. 252 00:16:33,870 --> 00:16:38,870 So that was, you know, part of the story. My dad, his, 253 00:16:39,680 --> 00:16:43,540 his extraordinary perception, his, uh, his sensitivity, 254 00:16:43,840 --> 00:16:45,620 his understanding of human nature. 255 00:16:46,880 --> 00:16:48,940 Did you believe in the God he believed in? 256 00:16:49,690 --> 00:16:54,630 Well, I went through my childhood, going to church every Sunday, 257 00:16:56,320 --> 00:16:59,060 and I went, uh, when I was sent away to school, 258 00:16:59,090 --> 00:17:02,420 they were Anglo-Catholic schools. They were very high church schools. 259 00:17:03,360 --> 00:17:06,940 And we used to go to church every Sunday and, and, uh, 260 00:17:07,310 --> 00:17:11,540 every evening at those schools, uh, 261 00:17:11,700 --> 00:17:14,620 I suppose as a child, I believed in these things. 262 00:17:16,600 --> 00:17:21,420 As I got to be a teenager, I found myself believing in them less and less. 263 00:17:22,280 --> 00:17:25,780 Um, okay. 264 00:17:26,770 --> 00:17:29,400 When I was 12, 13, 265 00:17:29,600 --> 00:17:34,360 I guess I was confirmed and I went through the process of, of, 266 00:17:34,620 --> 00:17:36,120 um, catechism class 267 00:17:38,300 --> 00:17:42,520 and learned about all these things. And, uh, the bishop came for confirmation 268 00:17:44,500 --> 00:17:49,040 and I was confirmed. And my father's confirmation book, 269 00:17:49,360 --> 00:17:53,740 uh, present for me was a, a little book called, since Woodland's Prayer Book. 270 00:17:55,780 --> 00:17:59,720 And since Woodland's Prayer book had a huge section at the end 271 00:18:00,610 --> 00:18:04,920 about sin, every kind of sin that anyone could ever imagine, 272 00:18:04,980 --> 00:18:09,960 it was all listed there and explained. And so how you would, you know, 273 00:18:10,220 --> 00:18:13,720 how, how you go, go to confession and what you say when you go to confession. 274 00:18:14,100 --> 00:18:18,320 You know, I was a big sinner by the time I was, 275 00:18:18,480 --> 00:18:22,680 I was 13, I was masturbating, gailey as often as I could. 276 00:18:23,810 --> 00:18:27,230 And I realized, you know, this was a terrible sin. But yeah, 277 00:18:27,490 --> 00:18:31,550 it wasn't a sin to me, it was just, just being a boy. 278 00:18:32,810 --> 00:18:34,350 And because I was in a boys' school, 279 00:18:34,450 --> 00:18:37,070 all my sexual experiences were with other boys. 280 00:18:39,030 --> 00:18:43,610 And I think that was instrumental in making me think that, you know, 281 00:18:43,610 --> 00:18:48,550 maybe this God is, is, um, questionable, 282 00:18:49,330 --> 00:18:52,210 at least that 283 00:18:54,200 --> 00:18:59,120 I didn't attach my sense of humanity to him at all, 284 00:18:59,180 --> 00:19:03,040 to this God. And by the time I was 18, 285 00:19:03,870 --> 00:19:08,480 that was the end for me. I was never interested again throughout my life, 286 00:19:08,610 --> 00:19:11,440 throughout my father's life. When, when I went to visit him, 287 00:19:11,480 --> 00:19:15,120 I would go to church. I would take communion, but really out of, 288 00:19:15,260 --> 00:19:18,860 out of desire not to hurt him. I married a Jew. 289 00:19:19,850 --> 00:19:22,290 I think my mother found that quite difficult to start with, 290 00:19:22,770 --> 00:19:27,410 although she wouldn't dare say so. But then they came over, 291 00:19:27,670 --> 00:19:30,490 uh, one, uh, Passover to stay with us. 292 00:19:31,190 --> 00:19:34,690 One of the two times they visited us in, in America in Los Angeles, 293 00:19:35,520 --> 00:19:38,770 they were invited with us to a Sada. My father-in-law's house. 294 00:19:39,670 --> 00:19:41,290 My father-in-law was a, 295 00:19:41,490 --> 00:19:46,260 a big kind of rabbinical style Jew who loved, uh, 296 00:19:46,400 --> 00:19:50,220 uh, ceremony and loved all the action in the Seder, 297 00:19:50,320 --> 00:19:51,940 all the discussion and so on. 298 00:19:53,120 --> 00:19:57,140 And he and my father got into this great discussion about the relationship 299 00:19:57,140 --> 00:20:02,060 between, between the Passover Seder and the Last Supper, and, you know, 300 00:20:02,060 --> 00:20:05,290 sharing the rituals and so on. You know, my, 301 00:20:05,310 --> 00:20:09,690 my father truly respected other religions he grew in, in, in his older age. 302 00:20:09,750 --> 00:20:14,250 He grew, got very close to the whole ecumenical movement, um, 303 00:20:14,790 --> 00:20:15,623 in Europe, 304 00:20:16,040 --> 00:20:19,910 which was an attempt to bring different religions and different, 305 00:20:21,310 --> 00:20:23,570 you know, Protestant and Catholic together. 306 00:20:25,140 --> 00:20:26,360 Did your mom come around? 307 00:20:28,750 --> 00:20:33,560 Yes, I think so. You know, I think if you, 308 00:20:33,740 --> 00:20:35,040 if you asked my wife, 309 00:20:36,760 --> 00:20:41,700 she f felt that she was never really able to replace my first 310 00:20:41,770 --> 00:20:46,250 life. My, my first wife that there was always 311 00:20:48,260 --> 00:20:51,790 this little standoffishness with, with my, my mother, 312 00:20:52,650 --> 00:20:57,150 but my mother was a little standoffish. Anyway, , she was, uh, 313 00:20:57,430 --> 00:21:01,970 a Welsh woman, uh, who a little bit shy, I think, 314 00:21:02,230 --> 00:21:06,810 uh, and a little bit reticent. And I, 315 00:21:07,050 --> 00:21:11,970 I know that she came across to quite a number of people as being aloof distant. 316 00:21:12,830 --> 00:21:15,730 So I, I don't think that that, uh, 317 00:21:16,460 --> 00:21:18,240 bridge was ever completely crossed. 318 00:21:19,590 --> 00:21:21,920 What was, uh, the, the boys school like? 319 00:21:24,130 --> 00:21:28,740 Well, I went to two different boys schools where there was a, 320 00:21:28,740 --> 00:21:31,980 a prep school, uh, uh, which is the younger school, 321 00:21:31,980 --> 00:21:34,260 the elementary version of the, uh, 322 00:21:34,260 --> 00:21:38,140 of the private school in England as the prep school. That was the school. 323 00:21:38,280 --> 00:21:42,700 It was, uh, based in Sussex, but during the war, it was, uh, uh, 324 00:21:42,810 --> 00:21:47,380 evacuated up north to the Lake District. Very beautiful place. 325 00:21:48,770 --> 00:21:53,600 Then we returned to Sussex after the war. And, 326 00:21:53,740 --> 00:21:58,040 uh, I spent most of my early school years there. You know, 327 00:21:58,120 --> 00:21:59,160 I suppose it was a good, 328 00:21:59,420 --> 00:22:02,000 I'm sure it was a good school in terms of the education I got. 329 00:22:03,060 --> 00:22:07,060 I think it was me more than the school. I just, I wasn't, 330 00:22:07,380 --> 00:22:10,700 I wasn't an easy mixer, you know, I wasn't, 331 00:22:11,790 --> 00:22:14,730 didn't like sports very much. I just, you know, 332 00:22:14,730 --> 00:22:17,890 I just felt I never fit in and always felt, uh, 333 00:22:19,830 --> 00:22:23,280 alienated and isolated and, uh, 334 00:22:25,480 --> 00:22:30,040 never grew into loving the experience as 335 00:22:30,350 --> 00:22:33,480 some did. It's pretty much the same at public school, 336 00:22:33,480 --> 00:22:36,840 which was the secondary version. It was just, it was, 337 00:22:36,860 --> 00:22:41,160 it was a difficult experience and not a pleasant one for me. I know I, you know, 338 00:22:41,160 --> 00:22:44,200 there are many men who came out with, uh, 339 00:22:45,000 --> 00:22:48,250 great careers ahead of them. You know, 340 00:22:48,250 --> 00:22:50,050 they went on to become the prime, 341 00:22:50,340 --> 00:22:53,930 prime ministers and the captains of industry and the military leaders, 342 00:22:54,150 --> 00:22:58,850 the generals and so on. That's, that's where the, uh, the public school is, 343 00:22:59,350 --> 00:23:03,610 was then more particularly the source of, uh, 344 00:23:04,470 --> 00:23:05,303 all, um, 345 00:23:05,510 --> 00:23:10,250 the higher British level of society 346 00:23:12,470 --> 00:23:14,370 was then. I hope it's less so now, 347 00:23:14,730 --> 00:23:16,890 although I don't England know England very well anymore, 348 00:23:17,880 --> 00:23:21,850 then there were many people like myself who really suffered through it. 349 00:23:22,570 --> 00:23:26,680 There is a, an organization now, uh, called, uh, boarding School Survivors, 350 00:23:28,520 --> 00:23:31,950 which, uh, was, uh, developed by a man I, 351 00:23:32,190 --> 00:23:36,910 I got friendly with after, after beginning to learn more about myself and, 352 00:23:36,970 --> 00:23:41,350 and about my brac, and understand things a little better. That is, uh, 353 00:23:41,370 --> 00:23:45,500 an organization that takes in, well, it, um, 354 00:23:45,880 --> 00:23:47,870 serves men and women, 355 00:23:47,940 --> 00:23:52,940 both who were in some way damaged by the experience 356 00:23:52,940 --> 00:23:57,780 of boarding school now being sent away from home at the age of six or seven. 357 00:23:58,240 --> 00:24:02,020 That's, that's really, it's a big deal. It's almost a, an act of cruelty, 358 00:24:02,100 --> 00:24:03,820 I think, looking back on it, 359 00:24:05,380 --> 00:24:09,680 and it's damage that took me a very long time to recover from. 360 00:24:10,740 --> 00:24:13,720 If indeed I have recovered from it. I dunno, , 361 00:24:15,300 --> 00:24:16,920 it is a, a lasting wound. 362 00:24:17,810 --> 00:24:22,720 Right? And it's one part, Lord of the Flies, I'm sure. One part, 363 00:24:22,990 --> 00:24:26,880 there's cruelty and abuse, sexual and, and physical violence. 364 00:24:27,420 --> 00:24:31,790 And I don't think, I mean, through the seventies, 365 00:24:31,790 --> 00:24:35,990 through the eighties even, there's still schools that kids get sent to, 366 00:24:36,010 --> 00:24:40,270 or camps that do so much damage to the psyche. 367 00:24:41,860 --> 00:24:46,610 I started my recovery, uh, uh, what, 368 00:24:46,610 --> 00:24:50,930 what I think of as my recovery from that experience in the mid 1950s, uh, 369 00:24:51,070 --> 00:24:55,250 in my mid fifties. I was in 1992, 370 00:24:57,590 --> 00:25:01,630 I was, uh, suffering considerably in my life. Uh, we had a, 371 00:25:02,750 --> 00:25:05,630 a big family crisis with my daughter and her health, 372 00:25:06,290 --> 00:25:10,990 and she was just growing up into college age. And, uh, she was, uh, 373 00:25:10,990 --> 00:25:14,990 with a therapist. And I called the, uh, therapist one day and I said, well, 374 00:25:14,990 --> 00:25:17,350 you know, what can I do for my daughter? Because I missed stuff. 375 00:25:17,350 --> 00:25:21,640 I've always been missed to fix it. I see a problem and I go, straightforward, 376 00:25:21,740 --> 00:25:25,920 and I find the solution. And, you know, that's, that's what I was taught. 377 00:25:26,510 --> 00:25:28,440 This person said, well, if you want to help your daughter, 378 00:25:28,440 --> 00:25:29,760 you need to work on yourself. 379 00:25:31,760 --> 00:25:36,140 And I didn't even know what that meant. I had always been, uh, 380 00:25:36,170 --> 00:25:41,020 very hostile to therapy of any kind. So I, I, 381 00:25:41,560 --> 00:25:44,620 on June, January 1st, 1992, 382 00:25:46,520 --> 00:25:50,000 I went to my desk to see my to-do list. I keep to-do lists. 383 00:25:50,820 --> 00:25:54,120 And there on my to-do list, there were telephone calls I had to return. 384 00:25:54,900 --> 00:25:57,240 And there were five names on, on the list. And, 385 00:25:57,460 --> 00:25:59,120 and each one of them was a Peter. 386 00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:06,420 So I kind of joked to myself, this has to be the year of Peter. And, and, um, 387 00:26:08,040 --> 00:26:12,980 and three months later I was invited. I was commissioned to go to, 388 00:26:13,160 --> 00:26:16,740 uh, to Rome Peter's city, uh, 389 00:26:17,500 --> 00:26:21,920 to write about a project by, uh, Los Angeles based artist, 390 00:26:22,010 --> 00:26:25,990 Peter Kin, who he is doing a huge, uh, 391 00:26:25,990 --> 00:26:30,470 light space installation at the trade and market in Rome. It's great, 392 00:26:30,520 --> 00:26:33,230 great experience. There was another, uh, 393 00:26:33,240 --> 00:26:36,430 Peter in Rome at the time from Los Angeles. His name was Peter Shelton, 394 00:26:37,430 --> 00:26:42,330 a wonderful sculptor. And, uh, so there we were, 395 00:26:42,630 --> 00:26:47,300 uh, uh, the constellation of Peters from Los Angeles in, in Peters city. 396 00:26:48,680 --> 00:26:53,060 Uh, I'd been in Rome a couple of years before, and I really wanted to find, um, 397 00:26:53,520 --> 00:26:54,620 Michelangelo's Moses. 398 00:26:55,980 --> 00:26:58,940 I had seen David in Florence before, 399 00:26:59,880 --> 00:27:03,020 and there was David that big spunky, youthful, 400 00:27:03,650 --> 00:27:08,540 wonderful projection of, of the power of youth. I wanted to see Moses, 401 00:27:08,760 --> 00:27:11,980 cuz he was the opposite end of life, you know, the old man, 402 00:27:13,710 --> 00:27:18,630 a little stooped and Ben off. And I, I had really wanted to see that. 403 00:27:18,830 --> 00:27:23,550 I couldn't find it. We looked all over for the church in that particular year, 404 00:27:23,890 --> 00:27:26,590 two years before we just couldn't find the church. 405 00:27:28,030 --> 00:27:32,130 And no accident. Accident. And, um, 406 00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:36,580 this year I was determined to see the Moses. So we found the church, 407 00:27:37,360 --> 00:27:42,260 and the church was San Pietro in Vali Saint Peter and 408 00:27:42,280 --> 00:27:43,113 chains. 409 00:27:44,320 --> 00:27:48,380 I happened to have been born on the Feast of Peters chains. 410 00:27:50,850 --> 00:27:53,670 So we went to the church and, uh, 411 00:27:54,690 --> 00:27:57,610 wandered around the church and, and, uh, saw Lee Moses, 412 00:27:57,660 --> 00:28:02,050 which an incredible piece of work. And, uh, 413 00:28:02,050 --> 00:28:04,570 then Ellie went off wandering in, in one direction, 414 00:28:04,570 --> 00:28:05,810 and I went wandering in another. 415 00:28:05,920 --> 00:28:10,290 Then I found myself looking down into a crook chapel where there was a real 416 00:28:10,290 --> 00:28:14,170 query. You know, what about queries? Mm-hmm. , they keep, you know, 417 00:28:14,670 --> 00:28:17,610 St. Teresa's little thing, fingernail or whatever it is. 418 00:28:18,150 --> 00:28:22,340 And there in this reli query was, is a beautiful gold box. 419 00:28:23,960 --> 00:28:27,260 And in the box was St. Peter's chains. 420 00:28:28,760 --> 00:28:32,930 If you know the story of Peter, uh, 421 00:28:33,070 --> 00:28:35,970 who after Christ died, he went around preaching the gospel. 422 00:28:36,270 --> 00:28:39,690 The Romans didn't like that at all. So they threw him in jail, 423 00:28:41,180 --> 00:28:45,240 and the Lord sent his angel down, and the angel burst us under the chains. 424 00:28:45,300 --> 00:28:48,600 And Peter got outta jail and went on to preach the gospel. 425 00:28:50,030 --> 00:28:54,970 So these were the chains that purported to be those chains from 426 00:28:54,970 --> 00:28:56,170 which Peter had been released. 427 00:28:58,470 --> 00:29:02,810 And I stood there in this church of St. Peter and Chains, 428 00:29:02,810 --> 00:29:07,730 looking down at those chains, my birthday. And I realized, 429 00:29:07,990 --> 00:29:10,370 you know, I've been wearing chains all my life. 430 00:29:11,740 --> 00:29:15,060 And I went back to Los Angeles with the, 431 00:29:15,890 --> 00:29:20,620 with a very clear understanding that I needed to get rid of those chains. 432 00:29:22,730 --> 00:29:25,230 And the day after I got back, 433 00:29:25,830 --> 00:29:29,150 I went to one of those art world co cocktail parties. 434 00:29:29,590 --> 00:29:34,390 I was a writer and was fairly prominent in the art community 435 00:29:34,450 --> 00:29:38,470 for a long time. I was at one of those art world cocktail parties. 436 00:29:38,570 --> 00:29:43,100 And I ran into a man and I told him this story, and he said, 437 00:29:43,140 --> 00:29:44,660 I know just what you need to do. 438 00:29:45,560 --> 00:29:49,460 And he told me about this weekend that he had done training weekend. 439 00:29:50,520 --> 00:29:54,180 And he told me it was called the, the, the New Warrior Training Adventure. 440 00:29:55,530 --> 00:30:00,110 And I said, oh my God, that is the last thing I need to do, warriors training, 441 00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:05,410 adventures, Jesus. Not for me. So of course, 442 00:30:05,450 --> 00:30:10,280 I signed up the next day and went down to the, 443 00:30:10,460 --> 00:30:15,240 uh, uh, to the training. And it was, it was a complete life changer for me. 444 00:30:15,360 --> 00:30:20,360 I mean, I was, it opened me up like an egg cracked me open. And, um, 445 00:30:22,070 --> 00:30:26,170 it was the start of a whole new period in my life where I 446 00:30:26,740 --> 00:30:29,490 began to be able to look at myself with some honesty. 447 00:30:30,390 --> 00:30:33,410 It really changed my life. It, uh, 448 00:30:34,230 --> 00:30:38,050 led me eventually, uh, into the, uh, Buddhist path, 449 00:30:39,700 --> 00:30:43,400 uh, because I realized that this was another way of 450 00:30:45,240 --> 00:30:49,010 looking into myself, looking into my own heart, finding out who I was, 451 00:30:49,360 --> 00:30:53,090 finding out what I needed to do with my life, where I needed to go, 452 00:30:54,330 --> 00:30:56,670 how I could become a better man and a better father. 453 00:30:58,370 --> 00:31:02,950 So that was that 1992, that was the beginning of, of, uh, 454 00:31:03,950 --> 00:31:05,770 of that period of recovery for me. 455 00:31:06,870 --> 00:31:08,050 That's incredible. Which. 456 00:31:08,110 --> 00:31:12,170 Is also in my book, , the whole story. 457 00:31:13,010 --> 00:31:14,930 I think people feel that, 458 00:31:15,960 --> 00:31:18,410 that there's a certain point where it's too late 459 00:31:20,160 --> 00:31:24,540 to find oneself or to figure out and 460 00:31:24,690 --> 00:31:26,420 unravel the damage done. 461 00:31:28,180 --> 00:31:31,320 So it's nice to hear that it's never too late, you know? 462 00:31:32,730 --> 00:31:37,030 Well, I was 55. I have, uh, 463 00:31:37,030 --> 00:31:41,190 stuffed many of those weekends since I've, uh, been on stuff. 464 00:31:42,250 --> 00:31:47,170 And there have been men both younger and older than I 465 00:31:47,270 --> 00:31:48,250 was. I mean, 466 00:31:48,290 --> 00:31:52,810 I have seen an 80 year old man go through that weekend and, 467 00:31:52,950 --> 00:31:56,210 and find the same kind of opportunity to make change in his life. 468 00:31:57,370 --> 00:31:58,203 It's beautiful. 469 00:31:58,600 --> 00:32:00,620 So I would recommend anyone, uh, you know, 470 00:32:00,640 --> 00:32:03,840 who might be listening to this to investigate, 471 00:32:03,870 --> 00:32:07,120 it's very easy to find out about it. You can go to the, uh, uh, 472 00:32:07,380 --> 00:32:12,320 the website of the Mankind Project, which is the umbrella organization, 473 00:32:13,360 --> 00:32:15,740 go to their site and find out about the, the 474 00:32:17,670 --> 00:32:21,200 initial training program, but also about other, other programs. They often, 475 00:32:21,850 --> 00:32:23,280 every other Thursday 476 00:32:25,120 --> 00:32:29,160 I meet with on Zoom with, um, 477 00:32:29,660 --> 00:32:34,320 up to 10 other men who have all been through the same experience 478 00:32:35,240 --> 00:32:40,220 with whom I have a, a real sense of brotherhood. And, uh, 479 00:32:40,220 --> 00:32:44,500 we just meet for an hour and talk for an hour. And it's, it was, 480 00:32:44,530 --> 00:32:48,460 it's what keeps me on the ground. It keeps me centered. It keeps, uh, you know, 481 00:32:50,130 --> 00:32:53,740 it's a very important part of my life, even today. 482 00:32:55,300 --> 00:32:58,380 Oh, what, 30 years later. 483 00:32:59,540 --> 00:33:03,510 What was something that you learned about yourself that you either didn't know 484 00:33:03,730 --> 00:33:06,190 or maybe weren't willing to look at? 485 00:33:07,270 --> 00:33:11,870 I learned that I had a heart. What you learn in boarding school, 486 00:33:14,220 --> 00:33:18,400 amongst other things, is how to protect yourself. 487 00:33:20,030 --> 00:33:24,930 How to build the armor that you need to defend yourself against 488 00:33:25,150 --> 00:33:29,450 all your perceived, uh, insults and enemies and, and, uh, 489 00:33:30,110 --> 00:33:34,050 all the things coming up, up against you that you are truly afraid of. 490 00:33:35,500 --> 00:33:38,520 And you learn not to show your emotions, you know, you know, 491 00:33:38,540 --> 00:33:43,420 and obviously not to cry, but you also learned not to, uh, 492 00:33:43,560 --> 00:33:48,340 not to get angry. I mean, I had an experience in, in what the age of, uh, 493 00:33:48,600 --> 00:33:52,740 oh seven or eight in my first boarding school 494 00:33:53,760 --> 00:33:58,200 where I got into a hassle with a, with another boy who's a little older, 495 00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:03,230 a little bigger than me. And the teacher in charge of the, 496 00:34:04,290 --> 00:34:08,300 you know, the whatever it was, was a recreation period, 497 00:34:10,890 --> 00:34:14,350 uh, saw that we were angry with each other and said, you've gotta settle this, 498 00:34:14,350 --> 00:34:18,510 like, gentlemen. So I got our boxing gloves for each of us, 499 00:34:19,170 --> 00:34:23,580 and all the boys stood around in a circle around us, 500 00:34:24,200 --> 00:34:29,140 and, and, uh, we had to go at it. And I was just beaten to a pulp. 501 00:34:30,180 --> 00:34:33,700 I, I'm know, a fight . So, you know, 502 00:34:33,720 --> 00:34:35,420 you learn from experiences like that. 503 00:34:35,480 --> 00:34:38,780 You don't get angry and you don't show your anger. If you are angry, 504 00:34:39,000 --> 00:34:42,460 you bottle it down, so, and you don't show fear. 505 00:34:44,540 --> 00:34:46,480 You know, these are things that, um, 506 00:34:46,710 --> 00:34:51,600 that you learn very intensely in, in that circumstance. 507 00:34:51,980 --> 00:34:56,700 And I had grown up and emerged from those schools, 508 00:34:57,540 --> 00:35:00,100 a very tightly armored person. 509 00:35:02,090 --> 00:35:05,510 One of the things that I learned, uh, aside from how, 510 00:35:05,570 --> 00:35:10,070 how to protect myself was, was one of the things I learned the thi uh, 511 00:35:10,210 --> 00:35:13,950 at the training was I really did have a heart. 512 00:35:13,970 --> 00:35:17,670 And it was an important part of my, um, of my being as a man. 513 00:35:18,960 --> 00:35:23,900 I'd lived so much in my head. I was very smart. I thought, 514 00:35:24,080 --> 00:35:28,900 anyway, you know, I, I could deal things. I I was practical. I was, um, 515 00:35:29,260 --> 00:35:30,860 efficient. Uh, 516 00:35:30,980 --> 00:35:35,980 I had been both an academic professor and a college dean. And, 517 00:35:36,280 --> 00:35:39,660 uh, so I was administratively skilled, 518 00:35:40,400 --> 00:35:43,220 but the one thing that I was really missing was a heart. 519 00:35:45,570 --> 00:35:49,630 And so that's the most important discovery of that. 520 00:35:50,430 --> 00:35:52,590 I also learned, by the way, and I, 521 00:35:52,770 --> 00:35:57,310 and I think I only came to understand this later, that I had a body again. 522 00:35:57,470 --> 00:36:00,230 I had been living in my head for an awful long time, 523 00:36:01,410 --> 00:36:06,030 and I was kind of scared and shamed of my body. I never felt it was good enough. 524 00:36:06,190 --> 00:36:10,550 I never felt, uh, comfortable in it. That was also an important part of the, uh, 525 00:36:10,550 --> 00:36:14,910 of the weekend. It wasn't, it wasn't just heart. It was, it was body. 526 00:36:15,010 --> 00:36:15,990 It was learning too, 527 00:36:16,970 --> 00:36:20,230 to accept and to begin to take care of my body. 528 00:36:21,430 --> 00:36:24,130 You like the tin man. The heart was there all along. 529 00:36:24,150 --> 00:36:25,450 You just had to be reminded. 530 00:36:25,880 --> 00:36:29,850 Yeah. And I was a bit like the cowardly lion too. . 531 00:36:30,590 --> 00:36:31,423 Wow. 532 00:36:32,150 --> 00:36:36,010 How did your relationship with your kids blossom after that? 533 00:36:36,070 --> 00:36:38,330 It must have been an awakening. 534 00:36:40,500 --> 00:36:44,700 I think it was, you know, uh, when my, my two sons 535 00:36:46,480 --> 00:36:49,260 who were brought up in their, in their young years, 536 00:36:49,260 --> 00:36:53,340 they were brought up in Iowa City, which is a long way from here. 537 00:36:55,260 --> 00:36:59,560 And I could afford that time to bring them out only once a year in the summer. 538 00:37:01,720 --> 00:37:05,840 So we had a, um, a relationship, 539 00:37:06,260 --> 00:37:10,680 not unlike mine with my father when we were growing up. I tried to fit a, uh, 540 00:37:10,740 --> 00:37:15,400 you know, a year of fatherhood into a month, you know, 541 00:37:15,660 --> 00:37:18,120 how, whether they're likely to admit it or not, 542 00:37:19,420 --> 00:37:24,200 my sons certainly suffered their own wounds from that period in their life. 543 00:37:24,720 --> 00:37:29,360 I came home from that weekend thinking how wonderful of my sons could do this. 544 00:37:30,220 --> 00:37:33,640 And they have never been interested. They always think this is a, 545 00:37:33,880 --> 00:37:38,400 a strange quirk of their fathers is, 546 00:37:38,860 --> 00:37:43,320 is of no interest to them at all. They, in many ways, they're like, 547 00:37:43,400 --> 00:37:48,150 I was as a younger man, I have a wonderful relationship with them now. We, 548 00:37:48,410 --> 00:37:52,350 uh, we talk regularly on the telephone. Um, 549 00:37:52,890 --> 00:37:56,030 my youngest son comes, uh, well, he's live still living in Iowa. 550 00:37:56,210 --> 00:38:00,790 So he comes at all once or sometimes twice a year to, uh, 551 00:38:00,790 --> 00:38:03,200 spend some time with us. Uh, 552 00:38:03,300 --> 00:38:08,160 he had his own long and very difficult bout with cancer in his early 553 00:38:08,160 --> 00:38:12,280 fifties. And so he has now a, 554 00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:17,040 a point of common relationship with Ellie that he didn't really have before. 555 00:38:18,300 --> 00:38:22,200 So we have a deeper relationship now. I don't, I, 556 00:38:22,520 --> 00:38:25,320 I don't have with either of my sons that kind of, um, 557 00:38:25,600 --> 00:38:27,360 I have very good relationship with him, 558 00:38:27,940 --> 00:38:32,560 but not that kind of depth of relationship that I have with some of the men that 559 00:38:32,560 --> 00:38:35,760 I went through that, um, that, that work with, 560 00:38:35,760 --> 00:38:37,320 with whom I share that experience. 561 00:38:37,860 --> 00:38:39,400 Did your sons read Dear Harry? 562 00:38:40,870 --> 00:38:45,250 I don't think so. Yeah. I can't force that kind of a book on them. Uh, I, 563 00:38:45,690 --> 00:38:48,810 I don't even ask them to read it. Uh, my daughter, 564 00:38:49,110 --> 00:38:53,410 who was suffering so badly at that time, you know, she has, uh, 565 00:38:53,410 --> 00:38:57,370 grown up into a wonderful young woman. She works at the American Film Institute. 566 00:38:58,430 --> 00:39:02,210 She manages the catalog of a hundred years of film there. 567 00:39:03,120 --> 00:39:04,260 Wow. That's a cool job. 568 00:39:04,640 --> 00:39:08,460 In the past couple of years, she has had, uh, past three years, 569 00:39:08,470 --> 00:39:12,940 she's had two major grants from the National Endowment 570 00:39:13,720 --> 00:39:17,840 for Humanities, uh, to, uh, 571 00:39:18,100 --> 00:39:23,000 assist her in, in, in her work there. She has, 572 00:39:23,370 --> 00:39:25,760 she's a single mother to a, 573 00:39:26,040 --> 00:39:29,820 a wonderful young grandson of ours. She's 11 years old. 574 00:39:31,450 --> 00:39:36,110 My oldest son has three children, one of whom is now, uh, 575 00:39:36,410 --> 00:39:41,030 passed university and is starting out, uh, a career as a teacher. 576 00:39:42,100 --> 00:39:46,870 Very proud of her. The other two are just finishing up their bachelor, 577 00:39:47,090 --> 00:39:51,470 uh, degrees at different universities. My youngest son, 578 00:39:51,610 --> 00:39:52,790 my younger grandson, 579 00:39:53,570 --> 00:39:58,450 is at the University of Nottingham doing classical studies, Greek and Roman, 580 00:39:58,790 --> 00:40:02,510 if you can believe. Very proud of that. 581 00:40:03,250 --> 00:40:04,550 And my granddaughter, 582 00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:09,060 my younger granddaughter is at my old college in Cambridge. 583 00:40:10,460 --> 00:40:10,970 Yeah. 584 00:40:10,970 --> 00:40:15,480 I'm curious about your book, the Pilgrim staff. What brought that to light? 585 00:40:17,200 --> 00:40:20,220 Oh, that's a whole different subject. 586 00:40:20,480 --> 00:40:24,740 And the title brought, made me think of Er . 587 00:40:25,170 --> 00:40:28,980 Chas . Yeah, it is a bit. So Syrian, 588 00:40:29,940 --> 00:40:32,300 I have an abiding interest in sex, 589 00:40:33,650 --> 00:40:38,360 and the Pilgrim staff is a fairly 590 00:40:38,860 --> 00:40:43,160 thinly described if somewhat exaggerated, 591 00:40:43,740 --> 00:40:48,220 uh, story of my own sexual life. It is, um, 592 00:40:48,960 --> 00:40:52,770 the Pilgrim staff obviously is, well, 593 00:40:53,780 --> 00:40:55,220 I don't need to go into detail, 594 00:40:56,520 --> 00:40:59,220 but it's set in the 17th century. 595 00:41:01,660 --> 00:41:05,200 And it gave me the opportunity to play with language a bit, 596 00:41:05,910 --> 00:41:10,880 writing in the language of the 17th century, and to, 597 00:41:11,620 --> 00:41:12,453 uh, 598 00:41:12,480 --> 00:41:17,270 distance myself a little from kind of 599 00:41:17,270 --> 00:41:22,270 current sexuality. I put it in into a, a historical frame, 600 00:41:22,280 --> 00:41:26,590 which, which was convenient and, and a little less embarrassing, . 601 00:41:27,450 --> 00:41:30,910 So I had a lot of fun writing that book. I really loved writing the book, 602 00:41:30,970 --> 00:41:35,740 and I think it's a good one. But recently, you know, one of the reasons I, 603 00:41:36,050 --> 00:41:39,460 I've been preoccupied in, in, uh, recent weeks, 604 00:41:39,620 --> 00:41:44,500 I have been finishing the second of what I think might be 605 00:41:44,540 --> 00:41:48,800 a trilogy of novels, which are written. 606 00:41:50,320 --> 00:41:55,180 Uh, the narrator is, um, it's written in the persona of a woman. 607 00:41:57,160 --> 00:42:00,850 I dunno where this came from. I'm just channeling this voice, 608 00:42:02,260 --> 00:42:06,420 which happens to be the voice of a woman. And they are, uh, 609 00:42:06,740 --> 00:42:11,620 strongly erotic novels. Um, some might call 'em pornographic. 610 00:42:12,660 --> 00:42:15,260 I don't particularly care about the distinction, quite honestly. 611 00:42:15,430 --> 00:42:16,900 Don't Tell Florida . 612 00:42:17,600 --> 00:42:21,860 No. Yeah, right. I'm working on, I finished one. 613 00:42:23,260 --> 00:42:25,460 I really liked it and I really enjoyed working on it. 614 00:42:26,170 --> 00:42:30,830 And now I'm 300 pages into, into a sequel. I don't, 615 00:42:30,870 --> 00:42:32,510 I don't know where this stuff comes from. 616 00:42:32,510 --> 00:42:37,510 Here I am an 86 year old man writing in the voice of a 36 year old 617 00:42:37,510 --> 00:42:42,220 woman. It is very strange. I have to tell you the, 618 00:42:42,360 --> 00:42:47,220 uh, I sent the first book out thinking, oh my God, I, 619 00:42:47,220 --> 00:42:50,460 you know, I really shouldn't be doing this. This is, uh, you know, 620 00:42:50,760 --> 00:42:55,260 out of bounds. I sent the book off to, uh, three women readers, 621 00:42:57,270 --> 00:42:58,730 and they all, they all loved it. 622 00:43:00,350 --> 00:43:04,090 And not one of them raised objections to the, 623 00:43:05,070 --> 00:43:08,570 the way I was describing sex from the woman's point of view, 624 00:43:09,620 --> 00:43:14,360 which is what was really worrying me. So I was pleased with that. 625 00:43:14,360 --> 00:43:17,120 And I was encouraged to start on the second book, which I'm, 626 00:43:17,220 --> 00:43:18,960 I'm now nearly finished with. 627 00:43:19,710 --> 00:43:21,450 Oh, the title of which is. 628 00:43:21,910 --> 00:43:26,200 Uh, it's called Bad Girl. The first one. Let's see if I can remember the title. 629 00:43:26,230 --> 00:43:30,240 Even. I forgot, I forgot the title of my new novel, . 630 00:43:30,980 --> 00:43:33,960 But anyway, I'm thinking this might be a trilogy, 631 00:43:34,500 --> 00:43:37,480 and if so, uh, you know, 632 00:43:37,480 --> 00:43:41,160 I might try to publish all three or find a publisher for all three. Mm-hmm. 633 00:43:41,200 --> 00:43:44,880 , because publishers tend to like sequels if they can, you know, 634 00:43:44,970 --> 00:43:47,360 cease a follow up for something. So. 635 00:43:48,020 --> 00:43:48,520 And I. 636 00:43:48,520 --> 00:43:50,360 Certainly tell, why am I telling you all this? 637 00:43:50,860 --> 00:43:55,280 Uh, it's, that's what happens. So, dear Harry Persists, 638 00:43:55,280 --> 00:43:57,480 which is a book about creativity. Yes. 639 00:43:58,020 --> 00:43:58,820 Yes. 640 00:43:58,820 --> 00:44:02,640 The Pilgrim staff. And then while I Am Not Afraid Secret of a Man's Heart, 641 00:44:02,660 --> 00:44:03,760 that's a memoir. 642 00:44:04,180 --> 00:44:04,800 That's a, 643 00:44:04,800 --> 00:44:08,800 that's the book that came out of the experience that I was describing you. 644 00:44:09,260 --> 00:44:10,440 At The Warrior Weekend. 645 00:44:10,860 --> 00:44:14,680 Yes. That was published, I think in 1994 or something like that. 646 00:44:14,830 --> 00:44:18,120 It's quite vulnerable to put all of this out into the world. 647 00:44:18,870 --> 00:44:21,000 Well, there are other books too. I, 648 00:44:21,200 --> 00:44:24,800 I was commissioned to write a book about David Hockney, if you know his work. 649 00:44:26,580 --> 00:44:30,800 And that was back in 1996. I think it, 650 00:44:31,250 --> 00:44:34,940 obviously he's very out of date now cause he's done an awful lot of work since. 651 00:44:35,800 --> 00:44:37,180 But this was the, um, 652 00:44:38,250 --> 00:44:42,180 Abbyville Press puts out a series called The Modern Masters, 653 00:44:43,840 --> 00:44:47,020 and this was the Modern Masters, uh, David Hockney. 654 00:44:48,130 --> 00:44:51,590 So there was that. And then there have been other books, um, 655 00:44:51,970 --> 00:44:54,910 closer to Persist. I did a book called Mind Work, 656 00:44:55,560 --> 00:44:59,350 which came outta my experience of, uh, Buddhism and, 657 00:44:59,650 --> 00:45:03,590 and working with the Mind and finding out more about the Mind. 658 00:45:03,830 --> 00:45:08,430 I did a book called Slow Looking Back in, oh gosh, 659 00:45:08,550 --> 00:45:12,310 I got some mid nineties when I was starting meditation myself 660 00:45:13,890 --> 00:45:16,910 and observing my own habits as an art critic, uh, 661 00:45:16,910 --> 00:45:19,630 going into galleries and wandering around and looking at paintings, 662 00:45:19,630 --> 00:45:21,470 and then going home and read writing about them. 663 00:45:22,130 --> 00:45:26,070 And I decided that wasn't really good enough. So I started, uh, 664 00:45:26,190 --> 00:45:30,590 I came up with this idea for a practice called One Hour One Painting, 665 00:45:32,250 --> 00:45:36,070 and I would invite small groups to sit in front of a single painting, uh, 666 00:45:36,650 --> 00:45:40,670 for an hour with me. And I would do a guide, uh, 667 00:45:40,670 --> 00:45:45,430 it was part meditation, part contemplation. I part closed eye work, 668 00:45:46,180 --> 00:45:48,350 part open. I worked looking at the painting, 669 00:45:49,260 --> 00:45:52,640 and I wasn't talking about the painting. I wasn't talking about the artist. 670 00:45:52,900 --> 00:45:54,240 It wasn't about art history. 671 00:45:54,240 --> 00:45:57,560 And it's just about sitting and looking at a painting for an hour. 672 00:45:59,130 --> 00:46:04,070 And that proved to be quite popular. I wrote a book called, uh, slow Looking 673 00:46:05,650 --> 00:46:10,430 about that experience. And then there was another book I published, 674 00:46:10,690 --> 00:46:11,270 uh, 675 00:46:11,270 --> 00:46:16,180 a few years ago called A Serious Conversation 676 00:46:16,180 --> 00:46:20,260 with myself. And there was a book about conscious aging. 677 00:46:22,730 --> 00:46:25,830 So there, you know, there's a number of books along the way. And, uh, 678 00:46:26,660 --> 00:46:30,120 before that I wrote two novels, two books of poetry. 679 00:46:30,740 --> 00:46:32,800 So there have been books along the way. 680 00:46:33,510 --> 00:46:34,570 You're quite prolific. 681 00:46:36,640 --> 00:46:40,560 I, you know, I look at, uh, a, a writer like, um, 682 00:46:41,160 --> 00:46:45,450 I know if you know him, Anthony Horowitz, he's an English writer, you know, 683 00:46:45,450 --> 00:46:49,640 it's television series like Foils War and, uh, 684 00:46:49,640 --> 00:46:53,760 the Midsummer Murders. He's also a novelist and a children's book writer. 685 00:46:54,780 --> 00:46:59,200 And, you know, his, that kind of pro productivity puts me into shame. Well. 686 00:46:59,200 --> 00:47:00,880 Stephen King writes a gazillion books. 687 00:47:01,110 --> 00:47:05,440 Stephen King is another example. . Yeah. You know, it books out, 688 00:47:05,870 --> 00:47:08,200 puts out three books a year or whatever it is. 689 00:47:08,260 --> 00:47:12,320 So I don't consider myself really prolific. Um, 690 00:47:13,100 --> 00:47:16,720 but I do keep writing. And that's, you know, there are a, 691 00:47:16,920 --> 00:47:20,600 a few things that really keep me on an even keel and help me to approach 692 00:47:21,820 --> 00:47:26,350 my latter years with a kind of equanimity, 693 00:47:28,170 --> 00:47:32,540 perhaps the most, well, um, I don't wanna put them in order in importance, 694 00:47:32,640 --> 00:47:35,330 but certainly meditation is one of them. 695 00:47:36,940 --> 00:47:41,650 Something I do every day. And, uh, it's a discipline, a practice, 696 00:47:41,990 --> 00:47:46,860 and it keeps me centered. And the second thing is my writing. 697 00:47:48,400 --> 00:47:50,770 Another thing I do virtually every day, 698 00:47:51,130 --> 00:47:55,810 although I give myself Sundays off these days at my wife's insistence 699 00:47:56,890 --> 00:48:00,010 , I don't think I would if it weren't, if it weren't for her saying, 700 00:48:00,010 --> 00:48:04,610 you can't do this every day. And then there's my, uh, conscious aging group, 701 00:48:04,750 --> 00:48:09,490 the group I told you about of I know maybe 10 men who meet, 702 00:48:09,950 --> 00:48:11,770 uh, every other Thursday for just an hour. 703 00:48:13,010 --> 00:48:17,550 And that's another kind of critical element in my life. Even though it takes, 704 00:48:17,770 --> 00:48:18,180 you know, 705 00:48:18,180 --> 00:48:23,030 just a small amount of time we share with each other the 706 00:48:23,030 --> 00:48:27,310 experience of growing old and various topics 707 00:48:27,560 --> 00:48:31,670 associated. I, I, um, initiated a, 708 00:48:31,910 --> 00:48:34,270 a session the other day about fatherhood, 709 00:48:35,660 --> 00:48:39,770 about what it meant to be a father. We don't, we don't have to say a lot 710 00:48:41,780 --> 00:48:45,870 because we know so much about what's going on in each other's hearts. 711 00:48:46,810 --> 00:48:50,430 Now we have that connection. It's a very immediate, very, 712 00:48:51,220 --> 00:48:53,590 very deep, very brotherly connection. 713 00:48:55,250 --> 00:48:59,070 Do you feel that you still carry any regret or have you worked through it? 714 00:49:01,630 --> 00:49:05,970 I don't see it so much as regret. I see it as a sadness. 715 00:49:07,810 --> 00:49:11,590 And I certainly carry that sadness about a number of things. 716 00:49:12,050 --> 00:49:16,830 Things that I, I felt that I've done in my life, which, you know, 717 00:49:16,850 --> 00:49:21,030 are consequential and not very helpful to anyone. And, uh, 718 00:49:21,030 --> 00:49:25,570 sadness about my sons sadness about, you know, 719 00:49:25,750 --> 00:49:27,810 no matter how much I write and how much I publish, 720 00:49:28,650 --> 00:49:31,090 I always feel I should have done more. 721 00:49:31,920 --> 00:49:34,370 That I should have made a bigger contribution that I've made. 722 00:49:34,470 --> 00:49:36,010 And there's a sadness around that. 723 00:49:37,280 --> 00:49:41,930 It's n n none of it is particularly rational, but, um, 724 00:49:42,200 --> 00:49:45,970 it's there. I don't, I I don't see them as regrets, 725 00:49:47,600 --> 00:49:52,010 regrets, you know, chastising yourself and, 726 00:49:52,550 --> 00:49:55,210 and, and telling. This is simply the realization 727 00:49:56,760 --> 00:49:59,010 that there could have been more, let's say. 728 00:50:00,770 --> 00:50:02,150 Do you believe in reincarnation? 729 00:50:02,810 --> 00:50:06,710 No, that's my big stumbling mark. That's why I'm never called myself a Buddhist. 730 00:50:08,370 --> 00:50:12,630 Um, I love the dharma. I read, uh, the Dharma. I, it's a, 731 00:50:12,630 --> 00:50:16,230 it's a great guide in my life. All the Buddhist teachings, 732 00:50:16,940 --> 00:50:21,070 this is the one thing that is the real stumbling block that I can't really 733 00:50:21,070 --> 00:50:25,610 embrace that whole idea of re of rebirth. I, 734 00:50:25,850 --> 00:50:30,830 I think that when we die, that's it, uh, know. And, 735 00:50:31,210 --> 00:50:34,540 uh, we talked about earlier about God, you know, 736 00:50:34,540 --> 00:50:39,480 I don't have a God to believe in. Uh, Buddhism does not, you know, 737 00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:42,670 Buddhism is helpful in this life. 738 00:50:44,890 --> 00:50:49,430 It does not to attempt me to believe in other lives or 739 00:50:49,920 --> 00:50:52,670 lives. So I was talking yesterday about, uh, 740 00:50:52,690 --> 00:50:55,990 an interesting conversation with, with a man who, 741 00:50:56,010 --> 00:50:58,910 who is talking about the survival of energy 742 00:51:00,610 --> 00:51:05,140 that maybe that there is some kind of energy, our, 743 00:51:06,000 --> 00:51:10,140 our presence in the world that survives in some way. 744 00:51:11,040 --> 00:51:14,340 Uh, I am in my old age, 745 00:51:15,200 --> 00:51:18,420 and I have to say, you know, at 86, 746 00:51:18,470 --> 00:51:20,420 going on 87 this summer, 747 00:51:21,900 --> 00:51:24,020 I can't pretend to be young any anymore. 748 00:51:24,840 --> 00:51:29,440 And I kind of don't like those people who tell me, 749 00:51:29,750 --> 00:51:33,920 well, it's only a number and things of that kind. I think that's bullshit. 750 00:51:34,870 --> 00:51:37,450 You know, when you're old, you're old. And I, 751 00:51:37,530 --> 00:51:41,200 I do like to think that, you know, 752 00:51:41,200 --> 00:51:43,960 the body is not everything that, uh, 753 00:51:44,440 --> 00:51:48,960 I can think the bo of the body as, as a corpse in, 754 00:51:48,980 --> 00:51:53,880 in meditation and experience some kind of energy 755 00:51:54,010 --> 00:51:58,200 force, some kind of life force in me, some maybe a chi. I don't, 756 00:51:58,200 --> 00:51:59,080 I don't know what it is, 757 00:51:59,940 --> 00:52:04,380 but I do like to think that there's something there that is just not 758 00:52:04,700 --> 00:52:07,850 just just the body that I'm living in. 759 00:52:09,940 --> 00:52:14,640 Why do you think you decided that God didn't exist for you or 760 00:52:14,640 --> 00:52:15,600 doesn't exist at all? 761 00:52:16,480 --> 00:52:21,130 Made no sense. I mean, I lived through, 762 00:52:21,160 --> 00:52:24,660 through World War ii, you know, 763 00:52:27,220 --> 00:52:30,560 how can, how can you continue to believe in, in, 764 00:52:31,420 --> 00:52:35,160 in a God who permits the Holocaust 765 00:52:37,410 --> 00:52:41,670 and who permits if he's almighty, if he's all whatever it is, 766 00:52:42,410 --> 00:52:43,243 you know, 767 00:52:43,250 --> 00:52:47,990 how can he permit millions of people to die killing each other in, in, 768 00:52:48,130 --> 00:52:49,310 in a senseless war. 769 00:52:50,260 --> 00:52:51,560 In His name with. 770 00:52:51,880 --> 00:52:55,520 ? In his name. In his name? Yeah. I mean, 771 00:52:55,520 --> 00:53:00,440 that's quite aside from the kinda scientific, the, uh, age of, of, 772 00:53:00,540 --> 00:53:03,320 uh, in enlightenment and, and, um, 773 00:53:03,500 --> 00:53:08,000 and of humanism that we've been through in the past two or three centuries. 774 00:53:09,120 --> 00:53:11,240 I mean, they've, uh, opened for better or worse, 775 00:53:12,310 --> 00:53:17,200 that thinking has opened our eyes to look at ourselves and our place in the 776 00:53:17,440 --> 00:53:20,120 universe in an entirely different kind of a way. Mm-hmm. , 777 00:53:20,940 --> 00:53:24,040 we do not, the sun is not the center of the universe. 778 00:53:24,870 --> 00:53:29,100 Everything does not e evolve about human beings and their, 779 00:53:29,960 --> 00:53:34,390 their pitiful existence, um, from every point of view. I, 780 00:53:34,510 --> 00:53:38,390 I think it's very, very hard to believe in, in God today. It, and it's, 781 00:53:38,410 --> 00:53:42,230 and it's a irrational in a way that doesn't, 782 00:53:42,230 --> 00:53:43,710 doesn't sit well with me. 783 00:53:44,530 --> 00:53:47,640 Peter, tell people how they might find you out in the world. 784 00:53:48,850 --> 00:53:50,980 Well, I have a website, um, 785 00:53:51,030 --> 00:53:54,450 peter clothier.com maybe foolishly, 786 00:53:54,550 --> 00:53:58,080 but I do quite a lot of posting on Facebook. Uh, 787 00:53:58,080 --> 00:54:02,320 you can find me under Peter Clothier on Facebook, and I publish, 788 00:54:02,860 --> 00:54:07,720 you know, a lot about my life, quite honestly. Uh, what's going on in my life. 789 00:54:08,780 --> 00:54:11,660 I get criticized sometimes from, uh, 790 00:54:11,690 --> 00:54:15,580 from more serious people about, uh, you know, 791 00:54:15,600 --> 00:54:16,820 why do you write about yourself? 792 00:54:16,820 --> 00:54:19,540 Why do you have to say all these things about yourself? And so on. 793 00:54:20,820 --> 00:54:25,440 But then I have a, a lot of people who read, 794 00:54:26,020 --> 00:54:30,360 uh, what I write because it speaks to them about their own lives, 795 00:54:30,410 --> 00:54:31,680 about their own experience. 796 00:54:33,480 --> 00:54:38,180 And the comments that I get are almost universally, uh, 797 00:54:38,280 --> 00:54:42,300 of the kind. I'm so happy you're, you're writing about this. 798 00:54:42,560 --> 00:54:45,340 It relates directly to something that I experienced, you know, 799 00:54:45,340 --> 00:54:50,120 that kind of thing. And, and I, I write to, 800 00:54:51,220 --> 00:54:54,680 to make that connection with other human beings. 801 00:54:56,080 --> 00:55:00,020 And Facebook may seem like a very strange place to do that, 802 00:55:00,640 --> 00:55:05,060 but it has offered me a forum where I have maybe a hundred, 803 00:55:05,060 --> 00:55:09,380 maybe 200 people who read me with some regularity, 804 00:55:10,670 --> 00:55:15,220 50 to a hundred people who comment fairly re uh, regularly, 805 00:55:15,960 --> 00:55:19,660 and a greater number who do that little like or 806 00:55:21,020 --> 00:55:23,350 love or whatever it is that you do on Facebook. 807 00:55:25,010 --> 00:55:28,470 So it's a great resource for me. It has been a, a wonderful resource. 808 00:55:28,790 --> 00:55:32,550 I I do begin to wonder about it now with so much, um, 809 00:55:33,440 --> 00:55:35,550 going on about privacy and, 810 00:55:35,690 --> 00:55:40,110 and so far as my personal privacy is 811 00:55:40,140 --> 00:55:43,510 concerned, I don't have anything private anymore. 812 00:55:44,340 --> 00:55:48,870 It's all out there. Whatever you read of mine, you're reading about me. 813 00:55:49,970 --> 00:55:53,630 And, uh, if you're reading my erotic novels, you're reading about my sexuality. 814 00:55:54,410 --> 00:55:56,590 If you are, uh, um, 815 00:55:57,500 --> 00:56:02,310 reading Dear Harry or reading about me and my father, and, you know, it's, 816 00:56:02,340 --> 00:56:06,550 it's all out there and I don't care anymore. It doesn't bother me in, 817 00:56:06,570 --> 00:56:09,710 in the way should I be saying this, uh, you know, 818 00:56:09,710 --> 00:56:11,350 what are people gonna think of me that, 819 00:56:11,580 --> 00:56:16,150 that meaningless at this point in my life, I'm too old to worry about it, 820 00:56:16,690 --> 00:56:20,990 but I do worry about privacy. The other aspect of privacy, and that is, uh, 821 00:56:21,700 --> 00:56:23,540 information being used 822 00:56:25,400 --> 00:56:29,420 and spread at astonishing, enlightening speed, 823 00:56:30,520 --> 00:56:35,140 disinformation, uh, going out about the, 824 00:56:35,360 --> 00:56:40,080 um, purposeful misinterpretation of things that people say. 825 00:56:41,460 --> 00:56:44,240 I'm, I'm aware that being on Facebook, 826 00:56:45,340 --> 00:56:49,720 I'm exposing myself to that. I have been scammed very badly. 827 00:56:50,460 --> 00:56:55,160 Couple of years ago, uh, I I got an email, a phish, 828 00:56:55,260 --> 00:56:59,680 an email that nowadays I would immediately recognize as a fishing expedition. 829 00:57:00,380 --> 00:57:03,940 I think it would, I was told me I had been overpaid something, 830 00:57:04,650 --> 00:57:09,150 and it gave me a telephone number where I could, I could solve the problem. Mm. 831 00:57:10,410 --> 00:57:13,910 And that got me into a month's worth of 832 00:57:15,020 --> 00:57:19,480 really being thoroughly scammed and done out of a lot of money. 833 00:57:21,140 --> 00:57:24,600 And I felt very foolish, very embarrassed, very, uh, you know, 834 00:57:26,460 --> 00:57:29,200 and it made me realize how careful you have to be, 835 00:57:29,990 --> 00:57:31,680 even with simple email these days. 836 00:57:32,070 --> 00:57:35,800 Well, now they're using ai, deep fake technology to make phone calls. 837 00:57:36,640 --> 00:57:38,360 I was just reading about this on Newsweek, 838 00:57:38,470 --> 00:57:43,240 that to make phone calls and then they've mimicked the voices of your loved 839 00:57:43,310 --> 00:57:47,360 ones. And so now they're telling people, make sure that your family has a, 840 00:57:47,560 --> 00:57:52,360 a code word that would be used so that you can tell whether or not it's actually 841 00:57:52,660 --> 00:57:56,130 who the person says. It's crazy world out there. 842 00:57:56,930 --> 00:58:01,370 I got one this morning, in fact, which purported to come from the Geeks Court. 843 00:58:02,150 --> 00:58:05,050 Oh, yeah. That's a, that one goes around all the time telling. 844 00:58:05,050 --> 00:58:09,250 Me that I had been charged $119 or something. Yeah. 845 00:58:09,250 --> 00:58:10,410 Those are all fake. The Geeks. 846 00:58:10,410 --> 00:58:12,610 Squad renewal. Uh, and, um. 847 00:58:14,000 --> 00:58:15,770 They're banking on people calling, 848 00:58:15,990 --> 00:58:18,210 and then that once they get them on the phone, 849 00:58:18,210 --> 00:58:21,730 they can get them out of all their money. I worry about that for my parents. 850 00:58:22,980 --> 00:58:25,630 Yeah. Well, it's, it's a new world. I mean, 851 00:58:25,770 --> 00:58:27,950 we were not brought up with computers. 852 00:58:28,900 --> 00:58:31,450 Peter, this has been a really, really a pleasure. Thank you. 853 00:58:32,150 --> 00:58:36,710 Yes. Well, I hope it works out for you on your, on your, um, podcast. 854 00:58:37,700 --> 00:58:39,950 Yeah. I love the whole idea of it. I have not, 855 00:58:40,410 --> 00:58:43,230 I'm afraid listen to very much of it because, uh, 856 00:58:43,820 --> 00:58:46,070 I've been preoccupied with finishing my novel. 857 00:58:46,210 --> 00:58:47,110 Understandable. 858 00:58:48,450 --> 00:58:52,310 But, uh, you know, I love the idea is behind it and, and, uh, 859 00:58:53,370 --> 00:58:56,190 and the thing that has to do with humanity is all right with me. 860 00:58:57,030 --> 00:59:01,710 I try to try to make it diverse and I tend toward topics that I really enjoy 861 00:59:01,710 --> 00:59:03,190 talking about. So. 862 00:59:03,190 --> 00:59:05,030 Well, I hope you've enjoyed today's I. 863 00:59:05,030 --> 00:59:08,510 Have. Thank you, . I really appreciate it. And, uh, 864 00:59:08,520 --> 00:59:11,190 thank you for listening everybody. Bye. 865 00:59:12,140 --> 00:59:12,973 Bye-Bye. 866 00:59:14,940 --> 00:59:16,950 Rate review and subscribe to Hey, 867 00:59:16,950 --> 00:59:20,990 human Podcast on iTunes or wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks. 868 00:59:21,560 --> 00:59:21,780 Bye.