The Angel said, "I like black and white films more than color because they're more artificial. You have to work harder to overcome your disbelief. It’s sort of like prayer."

Have a look at www.bookcrossing.com - The idea is terrific: Take a book you like and set it "free" by leaving it in a cafe, a bus, on a park bench... Hopefully someone out there in the world will find it and read it, and then pass it on to other strangers in just as serendipitous a way. To keep track of your book's fate, put a "book crossing" sticker (available at the site) inside. The sticker numbers the book and explains what's going on. Hopefully, the finder will report to the book crossing website where they found it, what they thought of the book and what they ultimately did with it. There's so little man made magic out there in the world. Gestures like this are like those wonderful souls who go around planting forests tree by tree.

Jonathan- Was going to send you this a week or so ago, when it happened, but real life got in the way and it's only this evening, when I'm in London and staying at John Clute's place, that I'm reminded to do so.I get the train from Cardiff to Bristol late each Wednesday evening, after a long day teaching. The evening in question, I sat down with a cup of tea and an intention to relax the whole journey home before opening a bottle of wine at home and calling it a day.A young woman got on after I did, and sat opposite me, across the aisle, and at a table seat. She smiled hello in that way people do to perfect strangers on trains and I smiled back and wished I was ten years younger. About five minutes later, just before the train was to leave, a young guy got on, sat directly opposite her and proceeded to embark on what I took to be his standard pick-up line. About how nice it was to talk to someone on a quiet train, and how it made the journey go so much faster.She pointed to her ears and mouthed "I'm sorry, I'm deaf". Her voice, the halting, half-recognised speech of someone deaf from a very young age, bore this out.He apologised and explained quickly that he didn't know any sign language. She shook her hands in a 'don't worry' manner and all was well.A moment or two later, he fumbled in his jacket pocket and pulled out his mobile phone. Tapping away at the keys, he wrote a message and passed the phone over the table to her.It's not often that I reverse my opinion of someone in an instant, but right there, right then, I did. For the next hour, they conversed by not sending text messages. Each one would write a sentence or three, and show the other, who replied on their own phone. This lasted all the way until she got off the train before the Bristol stop.The expression of unadulterated joy on her face was a pleasure to watch. She was having a conversation. Exchanging God knows what, saying whatever she wanted without her hearing barring her.I smiled all the way home. I was as close as I'll ever get to being witness to a moment in a Jonathan Carroll story.

Hope all's well. Best, as ever.
Tom Abba

While reading a review of a new biography of Cary Grant, I remembered a story a screenwriter had told me. This man had worked with Grant on and off over the years. One day they were chatting about women and Grant said, "I'm going to tell you the secret  to  seducing women."

The screenwriter immediately said "You're full of shit. You're Cary Grant. You can have any woman you want in the world. What the hell do you know about seducing women?"

There's a beggar I used to see on the street who I'd often give money to because he was friendly and in his own way, dignified. For some reason or another, he disappeared and sometimes I wondered what happened to him, assuming naturally the worst. Today I bumped into him in his old spot for the first time in a year. It made me very happy and smiling, I immediately reached into my pocket for some change. When he saw me, he sprang up and came right over to shake hands. I was sort of thrown off but recovered enough to shake and ask how he was.
Fine, he said. I've been travelling.
Good-- are you back now?
For the time being, yes.
I started to give him the money but when he saw what it was he wouldn't take it. "No, no--I'm just glad to see you again," he said and walked back to his seat.

The life that I have
Is all that I have
And the life that I have
Is yours.

The love that I have
Of the life that I have
Is yours and yours and yours.A sleep I shall have
A rest I shall have
Yet death will be but a pause.For the peace of my years
In the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours

-Leo Marks

A concept I've been thinking about a lot recently and which I was able to include in my new novel  GLASS SOUP is this: Wouldn't it be great if, at difficult times in our lives, we were able to turn to younger versions of ourselves and ask them for help? For example, you're frightened of something now because you've learned from past experience that you have good reason to be scared. So you ask your 27 year old self to take your place now. Because at 27, you were afraid of very little in life (for better or worse). 27 year old you had a sureness and confidence that for many  reasons you lost along the way to today. Or you meet someone wonderful, but in the past you were hurt so many times in love that you're wary and cynical about becoming involved.  But 19 year old you wasn't. They believed fully in the magic and infinite possibilities of new love in a way you haven't for years. If we have lived a long enough time, we have been many people, both strong and weak. Somewhere in our souls those people must still exist. Some of them were optimistic, bulletproof, trusting, sure of what they were doing, and sincerely believed life's possibilities were limitless. Scared, confused, depressed, wary, apathetic-- whatever frame of mind you are in now, there were time s  in your life when you were just the opposite. How great it would be if we could turn to those  other versions of ourself and say you can handle this moment better than me. Please take the wheel now and drive this bumpy part of the road.

"We use words to understand each other and even, sometimes, to find each other." - Jose Saramago

Once on a book tour of Poland, I was told some bigshot politician wanted to meet because he liked my books. I had never heard of the man but said sure, why not? At the end of the tour a party was given at a lovely restaurant in Warsaw. Almost all of the lighting in the room was via hundreds of small candles placed everywhere. It made things very intimate and romantic, if a little dark. The politician and I were introduced. Both of us were sort of stiff and kept smiles on our faces a little too long. He had brought his wife and daughter along so there was quite a bunch of us squeezed into a large booth in one corner of the restaurant. On the shelf behind the booth were a long row of flickering candles. As we talked, I unconsciously leaned back and stretched my arm across the top of the booth. The politician's teenage daughter was next to me and we chatted. Suddenly her eyes widened in real alarm, seeing something behind me. Turning, I saw that my arm was on fire. I had put it too close to the candles back there and guess what? Half the length of my arm was on fire. Flames, smoke, the whole thing. The politician was sitting on my other side. When he saw (or smelled) what was happening, without a moment's hesitation he took both his and my water glasses and threw them on my jacket, dowsing the flames. Silently, he helped me take off the jacket which by then was wet, still smoking and smelly. I looked at it in my lap, then at him and said "I'd vote for you."

A friend asked yesterday if this blog is addressed to anyone in particular? I said yes-- it's a love letter to someone I haven't met yet.

"The long haired woman out for a Sunday walk alone by the Danube. She's dressed up-- silk, leather, high heels. Did she wear this nice outfit just because she felt like it, or because she's going somewhere afterwards, manybe meeting someone special? Her head is down; her hands in the pockets of her trousers. Her shiny hair falls straight, a brown curtain hiding her face. I'm dying to see that face but the curtain doesn't move enough. She continues looking at the ground, probably thinking something over. She passes by going in the opposite direction. I don't turn around but can still hear her high heels clicking the pavement for quite a while. I smile, feeling both cheated and pleased at the mystery. It's so easy to fall a little in love with strangers.

The nerd who is accidentally very fashionable because the clothes he wears-- Puma sneakers, Adidas three stripe warm up jacket, rectangular black eyeglasses-- are IN these days. The irony of course being that he bought those things five or ten years ago at discount stores. Back then they were dirt cheap and plentiful because no one would be caught dead wearing them, they were so out.

"Love doesn't need a reason. Hate needs a reason."
- Stephen Dobyns

"Express yourself-- it's later than you think."
-Brad Holland