St Marks
Jeane, The Headstone Huntress, reminded me of my one visit to the Drawing Room of Europe, St. Mark's Square in Venice. What fixed it in my then 12-year-old brain were not the pigeons, Campanile, or the gilt facade of the Doges' Palace, but (as it was a leaden-skied, sweltering day) the almost frozen, freshest, most lusciously refreshing, long, cold glass of on-the-spot-crushed lemon juice I have ever tasted to this day. Astonishing how our senses decide to store certain experiences, but dump millions upon millions of others. The cafe with the crusher was through an opening on the side of the square opposite The Campanile, and its shade was so welcome before we tackled the Palace and sampled The Bridge of Sighs where two American lady tourists were captivated by my explanation of the myth that its title derives from the final sighs of prisoners being led to their execution – adults taking seriously a schoolboy: just imagine!
*C.J. Heyworth has a front-row seat in one of the World's greatest theatres of life, Blackpool in Lancashire. His main interest is how and why memory works. In July he becomes a State Pensioner, though he is still 18 in his head.
