Well, here goes. I was born in Australia. Already, dear reader, I hear you say, "Rubbish! Where’s your accent?" See what I mean?

To start again, I was born in Australia and my parents were pigeon fanciers – pigeon breeders. My mum bred the fancy birds – Tumblers, Rollers, Tipplers. And the Pouters, all puffed up. My father was into Racers.

I have to tell you that I came into the world hating pigeons. It was their eyes I hated most – they scared me – some orange, some pearly, some red. I also hated the sound of pigeons – still do; and when I watch them feeding their young I feel my own gorge rise. I must be one of the few people in the world who cannot face walking across St. Mark’s Square in Venice. Those little scratchy feet.

But what I did like was the moult, for then I got to collect their feathers. But that comes later.

I remember one school holiday. I had been back a week or so, long enough to be over the excitement of homecoming and already missing my friends and feeling bored hanging around, hanging around. Lonely and the sound and smell of pigeons in my ears and nose forever.

One day, when I must have been more tiresome than usual, my grandmother gave me a pane of glass – where she got it I cannot imagine, nor the succession of panes that kept coming – some pages of newspaper, scissors and glue. She told me to place the glass on the newspaper, leaving a wide border around it. On the glass I was to make a beautiful pattern, face down (not me face down, although she mightn’t have minded), with leaves or flowers or colours cut from magazines, and when the pattern was complete to place a piece of cardboard over it, cut to the exact size of the glass – are you still with me? – fold the newspaper tightly over the cardboard, seal it with glue and set it aside to dry. The result – if you had been neat and careful, and I had – was a tidy flat newspaper parcel. The next step was to turn the "parcel" over, measure an inch or so in from the edges and cut out a window. And there for all to see – tra-la – a beautiful framed picture of the things you had placed on the glass. I feel sure you really don’t want to know all this, although if you, too, have bored children, I could draw you a step-by-step. I think my grandmother’s intention was to keep me quiet for long periods of time, for it was time-consuming. Believe me. As art so frequently is.