Personal Essays

Brittany is close enough to the UK to be able to get BBC Radio 4 on long-wave radio. So each morning I'd listen to the forecast and try and guess how much of the rain would come our way. Fortunately it wasn't too much, but neither were our temperatures much different. One evening it was so cold that we had to light a fire in the fireplace. It needed a lot of looking after – putting on new wood, and poking around. Everyone wanted to do that, but only the grown-ups were allowed.

Another evening we had a bonfire and toasted marshmallows. It was hard to get the bits that were warm enough for toasting, but not so hot that it burnt. Avoiding the ash took a bit of skill too, and a few marshmallows were sacrificed to the flames after they got too ashy.