Becoming a grandmother is wonderful. One moment you're just a mother. The next you are all-wise and prehistoric.

A bag of apples, a pot of homemade jam, a scribbled note, a bunch of golden flowers, a coloured pebble, a box of seedlings, an empty scent bottle for the children. . . . Who needs diamonds and van-delivered bouquets?

Many a cat can only be lured in by switching off all the lights and keeping very still. Until the indignant cry of a cat-locked-out comes at the door.

Sisters don't need words. They have perfected a language of snarls and smiles and frowns and winks - expressions of shocked surprise and incredulity and disbelief. Sniffs and snorts and gasps and sighs - that can undermine any tale you're telling.

Sisters share the scent and smells... the feel of a common childhood.

One small cat changes coming home to an empty house to coming home.

Love is to understand, at last, the suffering of another.