The Photograph

When I trim my beard I do it at my work table in the garage where there's a convenient power point and plenty of light. The mirror I use came from my father. I'm not sure how old it is but I'm fairly certain he had it in East Africa.

By the time I've finished the trim there are hairs all over the mirror and caught between the mirror and the frame, so I clean them off with a small paint brush. Perhaps I was doing this unusually vigorously yesterday because the brush excavated, from between the mirror surface and the wood frame at the bottom of the mirror....

....a small piece of a negative from a black-and-white photograph.

It shows the wheels of an old aeroplane on what looks like a dirt runway and, beyond them, what is almost certainly a man in a calf-length dark coat and long trousers.

The picture is of no huge interest except that it raises all sorts of questions, few of which are likely to have an answer - like, was the photograph my father's, where was it taken, what sort of aeroplane is it, and why should it have been so important that the negative was kept in a bedroom mirror?