The question
How close have you come to dying?Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A recurring Guardian Q&A prompt asked directly across respondents and years.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
In a different sense, I’ve helped to try to resuscitate a dead man.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 27 September 2025 source ↗
Probably on a Los Angeles freeway.
When I was young, I was pretty reckless – my 20s were quite hedonistic. I don’t know whether I’ve been close to death, but I may have been without realising.
The London terror attack on 7/7 in 2005. I was in London the day before for the Olympic bid. When we won I thought, “I should stay over – it will be a great party tonight.” But I decided to go back to Manchester for training. Bombs went off on what would have been my route to the station.
Scarlet fever, 1962. Hypothermia, 1974. Lightning strike, 1986.
Honest, empathetic, daring.
Clearing up someone’s sick – it was on police duty.
It was reading out loud, but no longer. (I am dyslexic.) I was encouraged by my husband to do a speech for the Royal National Institute of Blind People, which helped me gain my confidence, and the fear disappeared.
An English teacher said, “You’ll never make anything of yourself.”
The children. As a mother you are constantly worrying whether you’ve done the right thing.
Trusting someone and being let down.
Milton Jones, Julie Hesmondhalgh, Alison Moyet, Julian Clary, Ronald Harwood, Mathew Horne
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