They were there a few years ago when I was about 55 and went into hospital and had my gall bladder out. The nurses had to put tights on me to ensure my circulation was OK while I was lying down and more than one nurse admired my leg shape and said they wished they had ankles like mine. But someone's stolen them.
For the first time in ages the weather has been so hot that I've worn shorts. So instead of my lower legs being hidden by trousers they are exposed for all to see (and mock). Having lost a knee cap when I was a teenager my knees are not a pretty sight at the best of times but at least they used to be compensated for by my ankles. Now, because of heart problems, it's just a straight line from knee to foot. I want my ankles back!
A question for my readers from abroad. Do you have the same sort of corned beef tins as in the UK? Ours have a separate key which is detached and slotted onto a flap.
The key is then wound and the flap unrolls around the tin, opening it. The idea comes from the days of the Boer War when cans of bully beef were sent out for the troops. Why do we still have them? Tradition? Whatever the reason I suspect they will disappear one day so I decided to photograph one for posterity.
Whilst photographing tins may seem a weird sort of pastime it may one day help with folk who want a blast from the past. There are a few things from the fifties and sixties that I wish I had photographed but which were so ordinary it would never have occurred to me. Things that we just don't see nowadays like toilet cisterns with chains, policemen directing traffic from a little box in the middle of the road, men with umbrellas and bowler hats, and my ankles....
