the serendipitous nature of existence

It's hard to imagine two more different; innate calmness and stoicism are not the obvious match for unstoppable cheerful verbosity. How do these things occur? Evacuate or stay; one leaves for a quiet year among the haystacks, the other hides under the stairs with innumerable siblings, counting with a sense of exhilaration the number of seconds until impact. The war seems like marvellous fun. When the end comes - the final end, VJ day, when the church bells were silent and the vicars voice trembled - there's a missing date. He's gone to see his friend in hospital (TB, they say it's bad). Some time later at the bowling alley, said friend appears resplendent in a pinstripe suit too large for such a skinny frame, only recently released from the ward.

"That's Glenys, don't you know her?"

"No, but I'm going to!"

B-movies, avant-garde jazz, the endless slope of Bristol. "Coo-artin'" is a delicate process of course. Tie the knot why not, Oxford, and then perhaps a couple of children. The first boy has a Bailey button nose, the second sports a more triangular Warren sloping beak. Amid the dreaming spires it's botany and Boots, Byrd and the Bodleian. Skipping on some years, I'm born, adding a third generation to the party. I often wonder if 1955 already knew that was going to happen?