If you stand at the edge of a volcano – this one is Vesuvius, in Italy – and you are nine years old, and you tip your head downwards to watch trails of smoke and vapour wash into the air, then you might decide that it is dangerous and ghastly. But you might also think: ‘this is very good’. That’s where my thoughts led me. I was nine years old. I was carrying a stick.

Since 2019, when I started at Black Tomato, I have worked in the digital and marketing team. I write; I provide artistic direction; I thread the needle of our social media, our films, our emails, our website – all the storytelling that goes into turning the world (which is very big; numbingly so) into stories. This is what I do. And it’s very good.

One of our much-discussed values is ‘curiosity’. Like looking into a volcano without balking. What else should you know? I like sitting outside tavernas on warm plastic chairs. I always carry a notebook and three paperbacks. I’ve spent a long time in Turkey; they know how to properly grill kidneys. I’ve travelled to countries that no longer exist – and to cities that have remade themselves. I often travel to attend film festivals; because I write, in my own time, about film. It is a very good way to see the inside of cinemas in lots of very different places. I’ve swum in rivers whose names I don’t know. I am very sure that I want to travel to Kazakhstan, but I can’t exactly say why.