Back To The Old House

It's taken a year for my mother to sell the family home, but 49 years to leave it. She's been elsewhere for a while, and so there wasn't much to remove. But still we were a little choked and it's been odd to think that there's no physical connection to that bit of Belfast now. I drove the kids the long way to the house, pointing out my former haunts and epiphanies, but they didn't get it. They said they would miss granny's wallpaper.

I thought I had taken away all my stuff, but there was a final bag of school photos and forgotten correspondence. I found a remarkable package dating back to 1983, when I had taken it upon myself to send the BBC a critique of punk rock in Northern Ireland and how it had gone wrong. It was hand-written, just a little pompous but I recognised myself in that earnest college boy. My eldest daughter took a look and cracked a smile. "You've been doing the same thing ever since," she remarked. "Yes," I answered. "I think I have."