Last summer we digested the dust of seven years and emptied tens of storeroom boxes, reduced the contents then sealed them in fresh boxes, ready to move. And amongst the dilapidated dolls' house, the sweet mould of forgotten photographs and fraying Persian rugs there was a fatly bound copy of the complete works of William Shakespeare. When I opened it up out fell two brown and sorry pieces of paper that I reckon were from a housewives' encyclopaedia of the 1930s or something. Alphabetically ordered, the pages contain little treasures of forgotten advice.

"HEART DISEASE - Avoid steps or stairs as much as possible. One teaspoon of sal-volatile, taken in a wine-glass of water, is a most excellent remedy."

"MUSHROOMS AS ANIMAL FOOD - Mushrooms have all the qualities of animal food, and must be considered as such."

"MICE, TO BANISH - Mice are banished by laying wild mint in their haunts."

"HARDY - To become hardy, gradually accustom yourself to less clothing."

Anyway that had me giggling, and then I turned to the front page of the volume and read what had been written there, dated 1937. It was addressed to my late grandmother and what really hit me was the last line - 'May you someday be the actress you desire to be.'
I hadn't even realised she had wanted to be an actress – I knew she had tap-danced onstage during the war - but this was a revelation to me. And a personal one as it happens to be my own aspiration.
So, a week on from the death of my other grandmother, the last of my grandparents, I feel like I’m shuffling closer and closer to my reckoning, despite being 19. [Yet is that not a pivotal age – your last of teenager-dom..?]
Sitting with this book in my lap, the scent of age and ink rising from those soft, old pages that fell out of it, I wonder if in 40 years time I will look back on how I spent my years at uni with nostalgia, or appreciation, or regret. Because it's really not hard in these recent days of rehashed fashion to feel that maybe history works in cycles.
Even now I’m procrastinating. Ok, I’m off to write my Theatre Studies essay.
xx