I’ve rather landed on my feet

Anthony 82. Retired Journalist. Author of many books. 

How are you? 

Well I think I’ve rather landed on my feet. I moved back to London after living on and off in Europe for 30 years. A lot of people said I was making a mistake moving back but I don’t think so. You can’t spend the day on the beach at my age, your body doesn't like it. It’s just not comfortable. I thought maybe that chapter was over. 

I decided to move back and downsize. I’ve worked for it, I planned it. I got rid of the car. Who is going to insure an 82 year old driver? I want to have a nice time. I wanted to be back in Chelsea, this is where my roots are. My good friends from the Sixties all live round here and are still alive and kicking. I go out most evenings. This is the next chapter.

How do you see yourself? 

Not good enough. Not active enough. I hate mirrors. I appreciate you can’t go backwards. I realise I am slowing down but I live in hope that something nice is going to happen.

I come from a Catholic background. My parents were very uninterested in me. I was shipped off to a Catholic boarding school at 9 and progressed through school in a cloud of my own. I went through school just waiting to leave.

I was very unsure of myself then the Sixties came along, everything was becoming liberated. The invention of the Pill meant life was changing and I changed with it. It made being gay much easier too.

I am creative, my mind is always coming up with ideas. Someone once said to me -  ‘The thing about you is, when anything goes wrong, you wake up the next morning with a new idea’. It’s true, forget the niggles and problems - in life you have to move on. 

What do you like about yourself?

I like the life that I’ve led. I’ve survived and had some good times. Life is about resilience. Finding things you like and things you don’t - I don’t like failure.

I don’t like anything physical about myself. I’d like to be better looking and have better clothes. I can’t stand shopping or trying things on. I don’t like not liking myself.

Would you change the way you look? 

Yes, I would be more relaxed. I like the idea of wearing head to toe denim, looking like I’ve come off the ranch - but that would require shopping. 

Where does all your energy go?

It’s wilting. I think you need a partner to drive your energy. I think you need someone to do things with. 

Would you look for a new partner? 

Oh I am auditioning everyday (laughing).

What are your dreams, what makes you tick? 

I am waiting for my next patch of luck, which might give me companionship. You have to make your own luck. By the same token you have to make your own good times.  

What’s your most memorable experience to date? 

Discovering that the person I lived with, I was absolutely in love with. You have loves, friendship, sex and parties in life but this person gave me the family life that I didn't have at my childhood home. Suddenly I had a family. I was sharing a house with someone I wanted to be with. It was a memorable moment when I realised I had family life. We were together 25 years. When the friendship broke up it was quite disturbing. It was as if the family had broken up. It was compounded by having to sell our flat. And I lost my job that week too through company adjustments. Three major parts of my life all gone in one week!

How did you cope? 

Because you do. You have to. You don’t feel good about it. You’re not chirpy but you think tomorrow must be better. I tried very hard to get another job. A job is more important than a home. It was only by getting another job that I could move on. A job is something to give your life some direction. It doesn't mean you’re not crying because things are so awful but the only person that can drive it on is you. It’s nice if there’s help but ultimately you are driving the machine. 

Within two months I was back in the harness. I was running a newspaper. I have been lucky in life. Like finding my perfect partner. I appreciated that. I have had real love. But he wanted another relationship on the side and although I could have extended to that, it wasn’t me. We ended up being best friends. 

What do you think about life? 

That’s a very good question. Why has God put us here? It’s not one big orgy - in order to be here we have to work. You have to work and make some money to survive. If we weren't doing what we're doing what would we be doing? It’s down to imagination. 

What do you think about death?

I think a lot of people welcome it. When my time comes please may it be painless. I understand suicide. I’ve had two friends who have asked me to drive them to Digitas in Switzerland - but both died before I needed to help them.

What do you think about faith?

I admire people who have a  faith. I think it’s wonderful. I don’t have it. I am an old fashioned lapsed Catholic - which means agnostic. In other words if you can’t see it you can’t believe it. When you see people who really do believe -  it’s rather admirable. 

The Catholic faith is all about sin and how you’re going to go to hell. At school the Catholic priest told me as a child - that my mother couldn’t go to heaven because she wasn’t Catholic. That reeks of cruelty. My thoughts at the time were  if God knows everything, and if God has put you on this ground and he’s going to take you away at the end and he knows what you’re going to do while you’re here and you're going to be punished in the next world why did he put us here in the first place? The hypocrisy in the church is ridiculous. Did you know gay men can’t take communion. Sometimes I think Catholicism is like a curse. 

Have you ever sensed any unusual happenings? 

Oh yes. In fact we once had a girl come to stay - she was perfectly nice. While she was staying with us the kitchen shelf came off the wall, everything broke including those unbreakable Le Creuset pots. Everyone said she travelled with a poltergeist. Then one time I was staying at a moated farmhouse in Suffolk. The owner collected tall Elizabethan chimney pots and in the middle of the night they all moved across the room making a terrible scrapping noise across the paved floor. Was it paranormal activity? It was certainly very alarming.

One thing did worry me. Years ago I was driving along a country lane, a dog ran out and got run over by the car ahead of me. It was dead in the road but I actually saw it get up and run away at the same time.