Every Monday on Global Comment, we share Something Special you don’t want to miss. To fit with the six core pillars of the magazine, these will alternate between the themes of watch / listen / read / see / taste / place.
It will be something different every week, but it will always be about something worth seeing, hearing or watching, or a place worth visiting or a food worth tasting.
This week, read this thoughtful Guardian long read by David Batty about being reunited with his birth parents – and how it didn’t go in the way we imagine such fairytale reunions might play out. It is tragic and hopeful at the same time.
Looking back now through our correspondence and my adoption file, these were among several glaring signs of the difficulties that later beset our relationship. But, at the time, I didn’t dwell on them, more interested to read about what we had in common: a love of art, architecture, design and literature. So, it wasn’t until Susan and I met in the spring of 2005 in Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall that I first had a sense of foreboding. I remember scanning the crowd with the baptist reverend’s description of her in mind: “She is a slim, attractive girl with long fair hair and rather pointed features.” My eyes settled on a small thin woman in black, with a somewhat severe dyed blond bob. There was something brittle in her manner that troubled me. To my surprise, my immediate thought was, “Don’t let it be her.” Of course, it was.
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