This is a little like Life of Pi, where [spoiler alert] two possible yet conflicting stories are presented, where one is much more compelling than the other, even though it is likely not the true story. 

Which one do you believe?

ps. at #495, this is the start of the countdown to the 500th postcard! 

(photos taken in the Egyptian gallery of the British Museum)

Another 40th. When I realised 2013 marked my 40th birthday, I hadn’t considered that returning to the UK would put me back around a small number of remaining old friends all turning 40 within a year of me. It’s been a few months of reunions with people with more coherent memories than mine, recalling shared childhood birthday parties in my back garden, old school teachers, presents given and lost. My recollection extends as far as acknowledging peoples’ existence but very few if any specific individual memories and the consistent disequilibrium with their memories of me is notable.
Two explanations.

One, that as I moved from school to school, country to country, that those left behind reinforced their collective memories, whereas I’ve had to assimilate a new set of people and without repetition or group reinforcement, my memories have fragmented like floating icebergs and slowly melted into the ocean.

Or two, that I’m a self-centred bastard.