The Fishhouse

Even though it’s a redbrick relic of the days of Victorian industry, it feels as if it the fishhouse has always been there -nestling in the leafy glen of Stranmillis. The door is glass panelled wood which has shed its green paint and been gradually ossified by the precious humidity which it guards from the northern cold. Only a few yards away is the stump of a tree which turned to stone…I never understood this. It was one of several mysteries which grandpa told me about. Some others were…

That an astronaut has the same mass on the Earth as in zero-g
That God is just an invention by people who are afraid
That he had seen My Fair Lady three times
That sweeties taste better when they have been well squeezed
That smoking gives you lung cancer, but he still did it.

There were many other mysteries which we didn’t discuss at the fishhouse, however. These required no explanation until I was much older -and he was no longer able to answer.