Pleasure and a Calling (35 page)

In my lair beside the Common, among my stacks of files and pictures and observations, I have a stupendous sticker chart showing where everyone has been, where they have settled and moved on to – each house-move a line drawn from here to there in coloured pencil, a criss-crossing of desires and dreams, one upon another, across town, out of town and back (newcomers and leavers have little arrows to indicate direction of travel), weaving this way and that until they are indistinguishable from one another, making a great tapestry of wishes, a vast life of plans. I will sit for hours poring over it, cross-referring among my keys and maps and family profiles and holiday snapshots, a god at play.

And why not? This is who I am, guardian of the plans, though I have no plans of my own, of course. I am happy on the fringes, listening and watching, excitedly awaiting your next move. I dissolve into the surroundings and breathe your air. I come in peace. I bring my love.

Big thanks to Chris Riddell, Jon Linstead and Tim Adams, without whom I would still be at the thinking stage; to Neil Smith and Jonathan Wilson for unflinching man support; to all at the Fellow in whose precincts this book was brought to the boil. Highest regards to Veronique Baxter and Susanna Wadeson for their guidance and good sense. And love to my wife, Sue, for the usual countless personal reasons.

William Heming – in his doubletalk about the double life – read at least the prologue of Adam Phillips’s excellent book
Missing Out: In Praise of the Unlived Life
. Any errors arising are his rather than mine, or indeed Adam Phillips’s.

Phil Hogan was born in a small northern mill town and now lives in a small southern commuter town. He is married with four children and has been a journalist for twenty-five years. He is also the author of three previous novels and a book of collected columns about family life.

Hitting the Groove

The Freedom Thing

All This Will Be Yours

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First published in Great Britain
in 2014 by Doubleday
an imprint of Transworld Publishers

Copyright © Phil Hogan 2014

Phil Hogan has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.

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Version 1.0 Epub ISBN 9781448169450
ISBNs 9780857521880 (cased)
9780857521897 (tpb)

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