It must have been something I ate

Spring, 2000. A bedsit in Dublin. Paola was out at her wine tasting course. I was sat at home alone, reading. I started to feel a little queasy. Thinking back over what I had eaten that day, I remembered the pineapple chutney I had used in my sandwich at lunchtime. We had bought a jar [...]

I remember

I remember a haircut in Norwich.
I remember a party in Gypsy Hill.
I remember a flight to Milan.
I remember a boat trip, a sunset at Portofino, and a kiss at Boccadasse, nine years ago today.
I remember the bridges on Venice, a gondola ride, and the early morning train to the airport, where tears were shed.
I remember a [...]

A face from the past

Christmas 1992.
I had just come home for the holidays following my first semester at university. The family had gathered for the usual yuletide festivities. Dad quietly announced that he had something to tell us. He had received a rather startling phone call just after I had left for university in September, but he had wanted [...]

Crazy Lady

The Crazy Lady lived in the apartment opposite ours, back in the days when we lived in a slightly more “colourful” part of town, when we were young, childfree, and poor. Crazy Lady had a face like a pug chewing a wasp. She had a small dog (not a pug, and not fond of chewing [...]

Kill me now

That moment when you just want the earth to open up and swallow you: I’m lucky not to have had too many of those in my life so far (is that a good thing or not?), but one small example springs to mind.
I was working as a camera trainee on a TV drama series in [...]

My secret shame

As far as I’m able to remember, the first film I saw in the cinema was Star Wars. From that point onwards I was a committed fan. I built up a collection of toys, books, comics, posters and other memorabilia. It remains a cultural touchstone, a reference point for me and my friends, and it [...]

“What next, big sky?”

As a child I used to enjoy stargazing (this was back in the days when there was so little pollution that you could actually see stars in the sky at night, kids!), and my father shared and encouraged this interest. He and I would walk out to the end of our garden in the evening with [...]

Movie moment

One evening in a pub while at university a friend started a conversation about “movie moments” - those perfect moments of your life that feel like they belong on the silver screen. As it turned out, most of the moments the other people present described were fairly tame and non-movie-like, although I guess they felt [...]

first memory

My earliest memory (as far as I can remember) is a family photo taken in a high street photographer’s studio in Exeter (Arthur Buxton, Cowick Street), where I grew up. I was about two years old at the time, according to my parents. It was a photo of myself and my brother and sister. I [...]

Tell us the one about…

I don’t usually do requests (because, well, I don’t usually get them), but a friend suggested I tell a particular story from my past. It hadn’t occurred to me that it would be of any interest to anyone, so if it bores or annoys you, blame him.
Names have been changed to protect the guilty. This is [...]