child

I learned a poetic new German word just now at the little health food shop. The man behind me had put just one item on the counter, a carton of Folgemilch. I asked him, “What is… follow milk?” “Well,” he began, and something about his tired, slightly harassed, but ever willing to be helpful expression […]

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In an unpretentious Italian restaurant where all the pasta had been made by hand, the chatting-family atmosphere fell into something much deeper and richer and darker. A cellist had walked in and in his overcoat sat down on a backless chair in front of the servery and began to play. Something, I don’t know what. […]

Oh, gosh. A friend of mine is visiting Berlin from Finland with her young family, they came here instead of to Budapest so that we could catch up for only the second time since we were both 11 and schoolmates in Indonesia. We saw each other on Friday and again just now, they are leaving […]

Today on the markets I saw a man hit his child. He and his wife were standing among the racks of a bright clothing stall, I did not see what the boy had done but I noticed a woman sitting at her sock & beanie stall knitting had stilled her two needles and taken up […]

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Heart-curdling rage in the city today. I was in a crowded shopping street when a man began to roar at his son. He was bantam-weight, wiry, blond, apoplectic: the boy looked six or seven at most. His little sister, used to keeping out of it, hung her head and looked away. Around them hundreds of […]

I saw a boy cross the road with his little sister. At the curb he made her stop and made her take his hand. I guess she was three; I guess he was four. He looked both ways. A car approaching slowly from two intersections north made him wait, and hold her back. His caution […]

A friend of mine driving her nephew and niece said, they were arguing in the back. One of them had a goldfish that had died. Girl, 3, asked, But why do we die? She kept asking. And if we die, why do we live? Finally her brother (4) said, exasperated, Joanna don’t you geddit? We’re […]

O, the sweetest! Boy pedalling through the old part of town with his girlfriend in a wheeled box fixed to the front of the bike. It’s intended for children. He is wearing jeans and a stripey shirt and a little pork pie hat. Her blonde hair spills over the back of the box, she is […]

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Years before I had driven from Adelaide to Melbourne with my then partner. We towed behind us the tower of terror: all of our possessions lashed to a homemade trailer. His possessions were mostly tools and mine were mostly books. In a seaside town we stopped with his best friend and her husband. They had […]