About my Aunt Nené
She spent her life clinging to the skirts of the mother who was also my mother’s mother which is to say mine and Betina’s grandmother. My grandmother’s skirts were like a priest’s cassock and her shoes were sturdy like men’s shoes while her hair was tied up in a black bun because her mother was...
Seabirds
Of course I know the seabirds were here first! They’ve had their own registered territories for God knows how many generations, and it’s very clear they must hate us. They do screaming nosedives, beaks wide open. The terns are worst, real warriors, and their aim is perfect when they crap on us. These shimmering white...
All the women I ever imagined
I had been in Germany for almost a year by now. One dark and rainy day in November – how clearly I remember it – I was skimming the newspaper when I noticed an article about an exhibition of new painters. In truth, I did not know what to make of this new generation. Perhaps...
An instinct to play
Very few species of animal habitually play after they are adult; they are concerned with eating, sleeping or procreating, or with the means to one or other of those ends. But otters are one of the few exceptions to this rule; right through their lives they spend much of their time in play that does...
