Swear by this Today.

kitchen table France/December 2019

He was a bus-driver, may still be as far as i know, but the last time i saw him was twenty or so years back and although he showed no great ambition to be elsewhere, but what do i know?

That he WAS a bus-driver.

Happy about that as it allowed him to dream his other dreams.

He lived on the edge of the city - this was a compromise because before that he had lived in the middle of a forest.

The middle.

You could only reach his ‘home’ by walking.

The neighbours were trees and leaves but he shared the bed with a mutual friend.

I suspect that their friendship has endured better than mine.

But what do i know?

That he WAS a bus-driver and she was an acrobat, though i use the term loosely.

She was older than me, probably still is in fact and she is probably still an acrobat, but not a still one.

She travelled a lot back then, not only by bus.

I can’t imagine her standing still.

Not for long anyway.

Though she was not a runner.

She seemed to glide most places.

She would have been a great witch, soothsayer or oracle-ess.

She knew the I-Ching, taught me about clay and cured me with garlic and yoghurt  in a circus-tent in Switzerland.

What did I know?

Nothing about any of the three.

Swear by them now though.