24.06.11

The first indication of problems with the marriage of my parents came in the form of a love note when I found my bag searched nurse for money to feed my burgeoning fruit-machine addiction.

I was from AZ shocked when I read ... "I want to touch your hands, your mane, your lips, your eyes ..." The words have sent their thirst fever in my brain already squirming and sent me all of a quiver. I showed it to my older boyfriend, who said quietly: "It must be an adventure," as if he was referring to his track in the basket.Although only a year older than me, at 16 he was already grown up - he had a moped and a girlfriend, and I saw him drinking beer at the pubs with other young men and women. He had left behind. I was still in braids sprouting pubic and display a prominent Adam's apple, but to start talking in the baritone cracked that indicated the onslaught of puberty.

I was always having baths and wash my hair, the operation of sparkling water used to calm me down. I sat around the house like a bird liver combing my hair of moisture, but never went.Instead, I held my brother's jealously guarded existence teenager before going to bed early with a book. I saw myself as an idiot, at best. I was also outrageously clumsy. I was useless with machines, things came apart in my hands, and I panicked and tore tissue. I was the sworn enemy of Josiah Wedgwood, and was forbidden to Dartington. I tatty shovel and a round brush my neck.

Source: The Guardian