In the morning..

Every morning I walk to work. I walk past the Vet and the pushbike shop, past an electrical shop, a fish and chip shop, a framer, laundrette and a haberdashery, past a chemist and a couple of banks, past the police station, the courthouse and a solicitor's office, past the post office and finally the picture theatre.

This morning, on the footpath outside the courthouse, was a photograph torn into tiny pieces. Not scattered but like someone had stood and calmly tore it up and then just dropped it. I wanted to stop and pick up the little bits of someone else's life and see what they disliked so much, who they now hated. I didn't. There were other people walking past and I didn't want them to see me unable to control my curiosity.

I find it so hard to throw away photographs, even bad ones. It's easy to understand why some aborigines think a part of your soul is captured when a photograph is taken. But it's more than that - it's the first form of time travel.