Ever since I can remember I have loved reading. This gave me the edge when I started school; my letter recognition and innate understanding of sentence structure and grammar made the transition to formal language acquisition quick and painless. It also paid dividends for my general schooling. A rich imagination combined with a broad general [...]
Entries from April 2007
April 19, 2007
Stone Fruit
This time last week I was driving with my father past the market gardens and plantations that line the river near my hometown. He points to a house hidden behind palms and Poinciana trees. There are rows of fruit trees and a For Sale sign against a wall. “That’s Kane Johnson’s house,” he says. “He [...]
April 17, 2007
Irma and the Doctors
One morning Irma Grese woke up, as we all will eventually, on the day she was to die. She was 21, a girl who had left school while still in her elementary years, had worked for some time on farms and then tried unsuccessfully to become a nurse. Finally she found employment as a guard at Birkenau [...]
April 9, 2007
Well, it’s a bit much, isn’t it?
Until I was 20, I’d never seen a dead body. Then, one day in Bali I went with two women I’d met at the hotel to see a cremation in a village some miles away. I suspect we did it as much for its anecdotal value back home as we did for any cultural pretensions. [...]
April 6, 2007
Friday morning, scarred for life
Early this morning I’m riding my motorbike home from a friend’s house. My head is foggy from too much wine, too much singing into the warm night. Back there my friend is still sleeping; the world seems to be sleeping with him.
The low autumn sun is behind me pushing my shadow along the road [...]
