Occasionally, children can suprise you.

I'm talking about daughter number 2, who's 21. We have had more than our fair share of problems over the years, my girl and I. We're very similar personalities and have had vicious, screaming rows aplenty, which must have entertained the neighbours within at least a 200 metre radius. She's hopeless around the house, (she wouldn't mind me saying this), does virtually nothing in fact. Her bedroom, which she shares for much of the week with her boyfriend, would not look out of place on the set of Withnail And I - curtains never opened, empty wine bottles, overflowing ashtrays, mouldy cups and plates, clothing strewn all over the place, no visible flooring at all - you get the drift. She recoils in horror if I ask her to pick up any of her younger siblings from school, yet has absolutely no hesitation in asking me to drive her anywhere at any time.

And yet, in many ways, she's become one of my greatest friends - we confide in one another and talk about everything and anything. The summer before last, she read my second novel and came to me and hugged me and told me she thought it was briliant. She understands how tormented I've been by this whole writing/rejection hamster wheel I have found myself on, amid everything else that has been going on. But now her life is moving on - away from me, and it's both a sadness and a joy. She's just come back from her travels, is now finding work in television and will soon be moving out as soon as she can get together a month's deposit for the rent on a squalid studio in Soho to share with the bf. And good for her, I say. Live life, take chances, be young. She's determined, intelligent, beautiful and strong. The girl will go far.

Anyway, the point of all this is that a few days ago, she and bf told me they had installed some writing software on the desktop of my computer. My computer's been out of action since then as the charging cable died and I haven't had the money to buy another. But now I'm back in business. I turned on my computer, and there was the software. They had chosen their own title for it, it read:

NEVER GIVE UP

I could have wept.