for MH Mr J storms into my class room and yells, “Sit down everyone! Why are you all out of your seats?” Mrs K thinks – if you hadn’t moved me to the room opposite your office you wouldn’t be so upset now! Mrs K draws herself up to her full five feet one and […]Read Post ›
I am not in Fulham Broadway right now. Nor likely to be for a very long time. But for the last year or so this was the image I saw twice a day every weekday on my way to and from what turned out to be my very last full time job! It wasn’t […]Read Post ›
For AAK My father passed his driving test when he was about 45 and immediately bought a car. Of course. An Austin A40: YMD 457 I think was the registration. Then he bought an Austin 1100 and we went to Poland in it. I have written bits about that journey. Six years later I was […]Read Post ›
I was in a charity shop today, and totally unaware of having said anything to anyone apart from, “Where shall I put this?” when a woman came up to me quite shyly and said, “You have the most beautiful speaking voice, how can I learn to speak like you? Your accent is so good, it’s […]Read Post ›
For A and B Sharon was an inspiration. I know this is a cliché but this time it’s really true. She could make me and, I believe, anyone else, do things I never thought I could. I made my acting debut – and my swan song, it has to be said – at the age […]Read Post ›
I’m on my way to the Tate Modern at the moment and I’m really looking forward to it. I’m on the train to Paddington and just thinking about all the exhibitions I have really wanted to see and actually made the effort to go to the gallery, yet did not manage to see them. Many years […]Read Post ›
Reading List Suitable literature for young ladies 1964 – 1971 Form III Mrs Nurse: 39 Steps; The Tempest Lower IV Miss Crowfoot: Great Expectations; Twelfth Night; Hornblower Upper IV M M Francis: The Rape of the Lock; Northanger Abbey Lower V […]Read Post ›
Not a holiday really. Just a record. Vinyl. Very old. We put it on just now and the memories flooded back. Sitting at home in the purple and yellow living room in Egerton Court putting on record after record and dancing and singing wildly whenever I was on my own. With the limited choice of […]Read Post ›
Copenhagen The story of Hans Christian Andersen as told by class 4a in Marlborough School, 1964. “Oh wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen,” they sang – we sang – in a very animated approximation of Danny Kaye in the film of the time. Our last year of school – we seemed to be in constant rehearsal, and everyone […]Read Post ›
For CC Do I exist? How do I know I exist? Does it matter whether I exist? What is existence? To be or not to be, that is the question. Except it’s been asked before. And I expect it will be again. There is no answer. But I‘ve been given a word – ontology – […]Read Post ›
Life Through Basia's Eyes 