You’re at Ashley’s front door, returning the dibber. ‘Thanks again for this, Ashley.’ ‘Glad to be of service. Get your work done?’ ‘It was perfect, such a simple and effective tool.’ ‘Like me, simple and effective. That’s how Jean used to describe me anyhow. You wanna come in for coffee?’ ‘Thanks, but I was on… Read more

            You find a dark pool outside the Langham Hotel. It’s triangular and does not photograph well. The still image fails to capture this suspended plane of darkness in the road, holding the rainfall. The rain falls and pools, settles and waits, as a heavy lingering and miraculous reflective surface… Read more

The park is under the topcoat now, behind the eyes and ears. You’re drawn to find other ways to mess with it, to lift the carpets, tousle the hair, open the windows. There will be more trips. The first one will involve guerrilla gardening and you’ll need to prepare for it in Mark and Andrea’s… Read more

The city needs a central park and it sits here between the cemetery and the museum. They named it the Halifax Public Gardens.  She arrives early on Sunday morning, wearing a dark blue trilby and a black suit jacket, and heads straight for the green wooden benches, forty of them lined up in parallel rows.… Read more

She goes into the museum looking for the Mi’kmaq displays. Yesterday she stood outside Mic Mac Mall holding a sign saying Mi’kmaq Mall as a hurried gesture of defiance and solidarity. Mic Mac, in this form, with a space between the syllables, has a catchy ring of contemporary living and fast food, so why change… Read more

You ask yourself if you could ever live opposite a graveyard or cemetery. And that’s what you’re doing. You walk out the back door, squeeze past the pristine car that’s too large for the backyard, turn right alongside the house and you’re facing the always six lanes of traffic, three by three. The heavy automobile flow… Read more

You carefully touch the sharp crusts, snapped off in an unconvincing even pattern, brittle, dangerous, demonstrating when stones become aggregate and for effect, the look of it, just lovely, the concrete edge of a huge building at ground level for nudging. The pebbles give strength to the dull grey syrup mass, manufactured offsite and assembled… Read more

You’re looking out the window on the first floor of the old department store in the High Street. This was Williams and Griffin, Colchester’s own, which started out down the hill in the street of your ancestors. It’s now Fenwicks. They’ve splashed out on the refurbs, although the metal-framed windows haven’t changed. You’re looking across… Read more

Hastings comes alongside like the fishing boat marooned on a traffic island outside the station. You thought it would be a good follow-up to Ephesus. Now the test comes. The studio in Duke Street backs on to railway tracks. This row of warehouses on the north side has direct access to the lines, goods out,… Read more