an uncanny thing happened to me in the cemetery the other day...

true story, i swear

Weird stuff happens to me. I don’t know why but it does. The latest is that I was on my regular morning run in Kensal Green cemetery recently and I happened to look down and there it was: A soggy and half-drowned post card in the gravel and mud. I’m not sure why I stopped and picked it up and wiped it clean with my glove but I did. Maybe this is why weird things happen to me? I’m always stopping and noticing stuff I shouldn’t. Picking random things up and carrying them home, like a magpie with pockets. The point is, I picked up the card.

On the front was a photo of another grave yard, not the one I was in but somewhere else. You can see from the photo it’s quite old. A nordic landscape. Possibly European I thought. Wild brambles and berries, mature stand of conifers. Wrought-iron crosses rusted under a blanket of snow. What struck me about the photo was the quality of light. I recognised it instantly from my childhood in Canada. Bitter bright cold. When you move to England everyone warns you about the rain but what they don’t mention is the infernal, relentless mid-winter dark. Two decades in and I still experience deep yearning pangs this time of year. I’d trade a month of balmy English summer days for one day of blazing blue winter skies, the glitter of sunshine on dry snow…

Vaguely curious, I flipped the card over. As I read the message, handprinted in blue bleeding ink, a cold finger ran down the length of my spine. I shivered, blinked up at the sky. Then I read it again to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating. You see, the postcard was addressed to me. Yes: me.