Alan first saw it in his mid-teens. He’d travelled with his mother to the hospital in Swansea to say goodbye to his Uncle Dan, a miner from the Gwendraeth Valley. The Gwendraeth pits mined anthracite, the premium smokeless coal. That anthracite dust was harder and sharper than ordinary coal dust – more dangerous to […]
Did every 1960s British secondary school have a murderous gym teacher? Was there a special hush-hush government establishment for turning trained, wartime, SAS killers into post-war cricket umpires? I only ask because, over and again, in occasional conversations with strangers in bars and on trains, I’ve heard stories of young lives blighted by sadists with
My walk took me into the old quarry by the east bank of the Allanwater, a pleasant, sheltered place on a windy autumn day – my usual stopping place to eat my lunch (on this occasion, a small pork pie and a banana). I was absorbed in my own thoughts, unwrapping the pork pie, when
I read somewhere that cats live in the ‘eternal present,’ which is why they never express gratitude, only pleasure. This strikes me as a pretty good life-principle: okay, gratitude goes out the window, but we could also say goodbye to regret, disappointment, guilt, remorse, etc. – a lot of heart-ache. I was reminded of the
The Wisdom of Work Placements Read More »
Dr. Ernest Mathewson was eating an early breakfast. He was about to head off to the University of St Andrews to examine a postgraduate dissertation. It was a longish drive from Glasgow and the external examiner’s fee was a joke. But, as he’d patiently explained to Mrs Mathewson, he’d accepted the invitation more than six
The Trip to St Andrews Read More »
