I am a clown … and I collect moments.
– Heinrich Böll, The Clown (1963)
The first thing I linger over, when I upturn the box onto my bedsheet, is an overexposed photograph of two skinny boys. It depicts me, aged 19, with a collegial arm slung over the shoulders of Ed, an old friend from school. The pair of us are crouched on a boulder on a beach in western Thailand, in the ungainly repose of people who have just hurried into position after setting a camera timer. The image is shot at an angle from below, and the purplish sky overhead prefigures a gathering storm. The rapturous look on my face suggests that I was either unbothered or that I hadn’t noticed. Whatever the case, I was having a good day.
