The driest month on record, the warmest month for many years and thats just under the duvet in my underpants!. The month started well enough with a house concert in Hove, 25 people in a front room and me. One guy walked out after the first half, i heard him say that ‘i was nothing with that Glenn Tilbrook’. Rehearsals with Glenn are going well and lunch can often become our middle eight. Life is good in our little camp and i hope it lasts. Some new older songs all trimmed up before Tilbrook goes off on his US tour returning just before our duo tour in October, he loves the road much more than i do and he owns it more than i do. Together we went up the Thames on a sailing boat during one rehearsal with Tilbrook’s on mass, it was wonderful to see London from the Thames again. Squeeze played the last festival of he summer down in Cornwall on a beach, it came and went very quickly and the set was finally put to bed, phew! next year a new set will emerge from the future which i have no idea about, and somehow that makes me excited. Most of the month i have been in the car, often 4 or 5 hours a day, 12,000 miles since June when the car arrived. Its become my front room on wheels. Very nice too. But im getting a little tired now and want to stop. Onwards. The Strypes are in town recording at Dean Street Studios where Glenn and i recorded ‘Difford and Tilbrook’ all those years ago. Nothing much has changed, although the wonderful record shops have all been replaced by mens leather clothing and Juice bars. The band have some great new songs and album two is up and running with all hands on deck. Brad and Charles are co producing and together they make a great team, the balance i would say is pretty perfect. My book is in its next phase, more work to be done as more editing is required by Clare my agent, who i admire very much. We are aiming for next year and i think we are close to closing in on the final chapters and tweaks, im excited about the book yet i live in fear of it falling down stairs, but who’s stairs im not sure yet. I have not been at home much and the Barn is a place where i have just kept re packing my overnight bag, the connection to home has drifted the more i have been away. This week im in Devon at Arvon the writers retreat. No internet and little phone coverage, a house full of budding songwriters, its my task to facilitate their ideas and their dreams of writing songs, Kathyrine Williams shares the role with me and together we make a good team, like a scone with strawberry jam. Arvon could be placed in Firle and work really well, i hope one day this might be the case. Im not sure about being away from home so much, its what i do but its making Christopher a tired old soul. Its been a great month for blue sky and blue sky thinking, its been a great month to remember why i do what i do. I have felt some odd emotions come and go, i have felt the anguish of sadness. The past repeats like an echo down a well, it hears my voice and there iam saying and being again as i once was, like the addict who falls down the hole in the road. I have seen Cissy once this month, and Grace once too, not enough, but paths have crossed its been so busy for us all. Riley is serving fish and chips in New York and Nat is being wonderful, looking forward to seeing her in November on my big day. My big day, im not sure about that, i want to let it slip by like another day. Life is incredible and i don’t want to miss any of it but being away from myself, its way too precious the burn like some old dog end. Love is a tree that stands on the lawn of reflection where voices and words nest. Children need more than can be given and adults perch in ever changing winds on the branches of ambition. If i could wave a magic wand what magic would i conjure up? a pot of brewing soup containing all the love there is, with spice, with spice. I wade in the water and i bask in the sunlight here in the fading hours of September, almost October, almost still summer. The Moon has moved around the field to be high above the downs where last month it was high above the villages. Soon the clocks will slip back and our days will be stolen by cold and damp shadows. Its almost crisp out there, its almost time for the leaves to fall and clog up the drains, stopping trains filling gardens and making cosy corners for spiders. The last quarter of the year has suddenly arrived and Spring seems many weeks away, there in front of me, the next year, the one that speeds up even more than the last. Its september, its time to breath in the last rays of light before we all nest again for winter. Im lucky, nesting is something i love, and if i had a chance i would be at home today nesting with Lou, not thee, i today here in Devon among the verses and the middle eights, here in the swollen talents of ambitious minds. i can feel the cold in the walls, i can see the amber light of the day as it trickles through the apple trees in the garden, and i hear voices, people getting to know one another. No signal, no internet. Do you remember those days. God bless the journey. Time to reflect and time to be away from home when i want to be home the most. This is a free house of imagination, just like this month has been, its the egg that boiled right on time. The kids are back at school. The nest is in need of twigs. And here i am talking… http://vimeo.com/107580836