Diary – 1 February 2003

I was brought up to pay little attention to vegetables, apart from beetroot, which was served every day, and carrots, of which we had two each on a Sunday, on the grounds that they enabled Spitfire pilots to see in the dark. And then last week I arranged to meet a friend in the bar of the Waldorf Hotel, and while waiting ordered a vodka-and-lime, no ice. After some time had passed, a small vase arrived with an enormous stalk of celery stuck in the middle and a radish floating alongside. Up until this moment, I had been feeling fairly gloomy – whether we are content or in a disturbed frame of mind depends, ultimately, upon the kind of thoughts that pervade our consciousness – but after half an hour spent sucking on the celery stem my mood altered, and I found myself humming. My friend having arrived, we crossed the road in the direction of Somerset House, and once there sat in a plastic tent watching the skaters glide and tumble upon the ice rink. A strange thing happened; the faces sweeping by, the outlines of the magnificent buildings, the small stars in the night-sky became magnified, clear as crystal. The radish I still held lay like a rose in my palm. Forget carrots. All one needs is celery.

Camden Town High Street could be mistaken for the set of a gangster movie. Down-and-outs swearing at you as you pass, police cars with sirens wailing speeding towards Kentish Town, bicycles careering along the pavements, large dogs sprawled across their owners outside the back entrance to Marks and Sparks. Last week my grandson became the victim of something called the Lebanese Loop. He had just put his credit card into the hole-in-the-wall outside the NatWest bank and tapped in his numbers, when someone clapped him on the shoulder.