A Bit Of An Event

For almost all the photographs taken of me in childhood - all lost when Mum moved out of the Gresham Street house - I could and can remember the actual taking of the picture. One of me sitting in a deckchair on Blackpool beach and pulling a face, when I was about six years old: I was in a mood because I'd got sand between my toes and had been crying just a minute or so before the shot. Taking the picture was meant to cheer me up. I can still feel the sense of frustration I felt at the machinations of the grown-ups trying to get me to smile when smiling was obviously out of the question. I think they thought the resultant picture was cute, although nobody said 'cute' back then.

And there was another of me on the same holiday sitting happily, nervously, excitedly on one of those donkeys they used to keep on the beach for rides for youngsters. What larks, eh?

Nowadays we're all photographed as much as the celebrities so none of it really counts somehow. And there's no longer that moment of surprise when you finally get to see the image after the film has been developed. As always we lose when we gain.