The protest march last Saturday was my umpteenth. There was chanting, banner waving and ululation as my wife and I walked slowly through the centre of London from Temple, along the Embankment and up to the Treasury where we stopped for the speeches. We were protesting about the excessive burden borne by women in the…
Space invaders
Sharing public space can be difficult. Yes, when there is plenty of it around, problems are less likely to occur. But for town dwellers, manoeuvring where space is limited, things are different and negotiation is often needed. There are rules of conduct, such as "first-come-first-served" and the offer of “after you” when for example, approaching…
Once upon a moonless night
The road between us and the neighbouring village - the strangely named Mejou Roz - has no frills. It runs around fields, through a hamlet and looks across to the sea. It has no markings, no kerb, no street lamps and it is very winding - 4km for us, two for the crows. It is…
Shell shocked
Just a short walk down the road from our cottage in France there is a most beautiful beach. It stretches in a long curve as far as the eye can see and at low tide it takes 10 minutes simply to get to the sea for a paddle. The sand is a fine white-yellow and…
Unidentified knitted object
Last Saturday proved difficult. Friends came for tea and on arrival gave me a present. I unwrapped it and thanked them but hesitantly. I am not normally ill at ease but in these gift situations the feeling is a famliar one. Rarely a month goes by without gifts changing hands, so, in addition to the…
Hanging on
If there are such things as retrospective anxiety attacks, then I have just had another. I am talking about sudden flashbacks, often of close shaves, where the memories momentarily send shivers of anxiety down one’s spine. So, occasionally, I will get a flashback to that moment when, as a teenager, I am clinging to a…
Aladdin’s cave
For visitors to London a traditional, albeit quirky, tourist attraction is the food hall at Harrods. In Moscow the equivalent would be the vaulted galleries at GUM; in Paris, perhaps the magnificent glass and steel dome at Galleries Lafayette. At the other extreme and again in Paris, there is the basement of BHV, formally known…
Harvest home
The last days of the summer holidays were frenetic. Jobs put off from back in July had to be done. The saplings needed stouter stakes to help them withstand the ferocious winter winds – this took one morning. The overlong reeds in the field needed cutting down – another morning. There was the usual cleaning…
Last words
By their very nature the last words people utter carry a very special significance. To those who are close, they can bring solace or can engender guilt and anxiety, but whichever, they are likely to linger indefinitely. They somehow encapsulate our memories of the dead person, even becoming a sort of personification. And there are…
Powers of observation
And the curious case of the Lowcock leg.. How conduct and values have changed! I was a young doctor and the consultant asked me to teach first-year medical students. The topic was, “How to examine the chest?” and the date - probably the early 1970s. The memory of the event is excruciating. The patient I…
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