Author: Thomas Kelly

I do not come from a family naturally used to horses, small animals yes, but large and unpredictable horses no! Part of my house sitting deal is ensuring that the two horses and maybe a Shetland are still standing each morning. Well, they were indeed standing and not only that, standing in the garden having…

It is evening now. I walk down the farmhouse track, and at the bottom I can go left or right. But in front of me an ancient highway calls me to linger and then walk and brush my hands over growing crops. It is still warm, with only the noise of crickets to keep me…

After a week of pain in my knee and back, I set off to recover in Southern France. I wake delirious from dreams, sweat soaked from many hours resting and knowing that like a storm, this too will pass. Today, I can rise, and move slowly, one small step and one small victory. The trees…

I have so many books that I can not sell or give away. But a thought came to me that, when the time comes, I need to take just a few on that journey. So as an experiment here are a few and why I have them. The first one is a book that did…

In 2018 I wrote a small piece about an airport arrival in Dubai. When work a career finishes and in my case, retirement loomed I left the UAE. It was a wonderful few years to live in Duabi after the quiet backwater of Bahrain and it was just before the expansion of Dubai that today…

Cross Roads Prologue: I am fascinated by the minutiae of what I have collected over the years, and more importantly kept. I always maintained a diary and the entries form the backbone of these recollections. In 1978 it was Standard Chartered Bank red leather diary, a sign of importance to me though it would have…

The window in the bedroom overlooked the town of Varenna and when the mist lifted off the lake she could see Menaggio and from there she would take the train to Dongo. This is where the war had ended and she wanted to see the fascists hanging, they who had taken away her youth, her…

It is early morning in Dubai. The compound where I live is quite and still, curtains closed, overnight dust gathering by unpolished faux-marble front steps and the dull hum of air conditioning units makes for the backdrop of noise to come. Underneath their matt white and rusty casings, puddles of condensed water provide tiny lagoons…

  Dusk always comes early in Manama being closer to the equator than other countries. We expatriates who live in the villas by Adliya in the restaurant area draw down our blinds at six and offer ourselves large measures of Indian manufactured gin called London Bridge and whiskey named after that famous and well known…