Friday July 2nd

Day 74

“Now sit down,” my father says, “and tell me all about it. From the beginning.”

So I do. Fo nearly the whole visit. I talk while he listens, his feet up on the chair, his grey eyes fixed bright on my face. I tell him about the nightingale and the bamboo and the silk worms.

He prompts me -

“Do you feel you learnt anything on your writing course?

Did you meet interesting people?”

Yes, yes I say. The more he listens the more I talk. Today I bring my world to him and he takes it with both hands, the way I have seen the Africans in Chipapa village take an offering. As if it was precious.

When he leaves to go downstairs and have supper with the other residents, I slice the prickly skin from a pineapple and chop it into chunks so he can have it later - instead of cake. I wish I’d written him a little note too and said,

“Thank you for the gift of my life.”

I can tell him tomorrow.