This time of year always stimulates my nostalgia response: the defining colours of Autumn, three significant birthdays (my daughter Millie’s, my sister Catriona’s, and mine) and the start of a new academic term. I almost feel the need to buy myself a new school uniform. Historically, birthdays in our house were rather unconventional – no surprises there I suppose, given that our family world had all the component parts of an Iris Murdoch novel, and absolutely none of the idio