Ravenswood 47 Bristol Road Weston-super-Mare Somerset July 20th, 1951 Dear John, Thank you for your last letter. It was great to hear about all the books in the Narnia Chronicles. Mummy took me to the book shop the day the second book, “Prince Caspian”, came out. I’m reading it every night in bed and […]
Author: John Graham-Pole
Letters to Myself 10
Letters to Myself 10 216 Clydesdale Road Antigonish, Nova Scotia May 7th, 2016 Dear Johnny-Boy Your last letter is the fifth one I have had from you. So I’m beginning to think this miracle isn’t going to end for a good few years. We’ve still got a long way to go before we […]
Letters to Myself 8
216 Clydesdale Road Antigonish Nova Scotia March 23rd, 2017 My dear Johnny-Boy, It’s so wonderful to have another letter from you. And just a miracle we should be “talking” to each other across almost seventy years. Does this happen to anyone else? And the dates of our letters are getting closer together. Maybe it […]
It’s never too late to have a happy childhood
Time for a new blog… this one about how laughter is good for whatever ails you Patch Adams says “Show me the data that solemnity ever cured anything!” I first met Patch, Founder of the Gesundheit Institute, when he came to present at an Arts & Health symposium we ran at the University of Florida. […]
Exeat
Extract from my memoir: News that will change my life’s course forever Exeat 1: Three weeks into my first term, I’m summoned to housemaster Mr Berridge’s study. I rise from my breakfast of congealed bacon and baked beans, fearful I’ve broken some obscure house rule and am to receive the ultimate punishment: six of the […]
Letters to Myself 9
Ravenswood 47 Bristol Road Weston-super-Mare Somerset December 4, 1950 Dear John, Thank you for your last letter. It was lying behind the gas fire in my bedroom. It was a bit brown and crinkly. I think this was because Mummy let me have the fire on before I went to bed last night, […]
First Blood, Hektoen, 2016
First Blood Hospital for Sick Children, Great Ormond Street, London, 1970 I’m astounded I’ve landed one of the coveted G.O.S. senior resident jobs: the academic nature of the place immediately daunts me. Everyone bows down to its status as the foremost pediatric research hospital in Europe, perhaps the world, the faculty all confining their work to one or […]
Memory
A new blog, and another letter to myself across seventy years… 216 Clydesdale Road Antigonish Nova Scotia March 23rd, 2017 My dear Johnny-Boy, It’s so wonderful to have another letter from you. And just a miracle we should be “talking” to each other across almost seventy years. Does this happen to anyone else? […]
Resolutions
Resolutions After fifteen consecutive days of posting blogs, I’m starting to feel enslaved to my resolution. A common enough experience, I know, especially around every middle of January. Resolutions vary mightily in importance—going cold turkey from an addiction to cigarettes at aged 31 felt like my life depended on my keeping it, which it probably […]
Boarding School
Writing to myself as a young boy has me revisiting long-forgotten memories. So I’ve decided to borrow another bit from my memoir to recall the awful day I was shipped off to boarding school at aged twelve – a rite of passage for many middle-class English boys. I’ll leave you to judge what lasting effects […]