Our last holiday together in Pangkor Laut.
When were you happiest?
Question
What is your greatest fear?
Identity & self
Question
How would you like to die?
Death & what remains
Question
What is your idea of perfect happiness?
Identity & self
Question
What do you value most in your friends?
Relationships
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
Asked in 52 of the 131 consecutive instalments of The Guardian's The Q&A harvested on 2026-08-29.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
On the island of Bequia—one summer, out of the blue, a benefactor (thank you, Charlene) flew our entire family there and put us up in a cliffside house that was a weird mixture of Gaudí and Fred Flintstone and where we went to sleep at eight and got up at five. In between we read, swam, hiked, and unknowingly enjoyed the last moment before the irrevocable shear of adolescence set in.
Vanity Fair, The Proust Questionnaire, Vanity Fair, March 2018 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 576 →The last few years. There’s a beauty to getting to an age where you really don’t care about stuff that used to bother you.
Sofia Coppola
American filmmaker and actress
Driving my convertible over the Bay Bridge when I was 18, listening to Thinking of You by Sister Sledge.
Björn Ulvaeus
Swedish musician
If it wasn’t for coronavirus, it would be right now. All my life I’ve felt a pressure to achieve. It’s gone now, and that gives me a sense of freedom. Whenever I, for short moments, forget about corona and climate change, I’m happy.
More from Sally Mann
View profile →The loss of a child.
Quickly, without warning, maybe even in my sleep, and while we're putting in requests: before I lose my mind and my ability to gallop across the countryside on horseback.
Reading. And, in particular, reading on the deck of the cabin while my children play in the river below.
Knowing when to show up and when to go home.
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