Swimming in the North Sea at midnight, surrounded by phosphorescence.
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.
The Q&A, The Guardian, 1 November 2025 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 577 →In my early 20s. I did my national service late, in Singapore. It was liberating to be in a new culture.
Either pottering around on my own or performing, so I don’t know what kind of person that makes me.
Visiting my children at college. I don't stay long, because their lives are so busy - the way they should be.
More from Tom Fletcher
View profile →I was in Oliver! when I was 10 and I peed myself on stage in front of however many people the Palladium holds. It was the stuff of nightmares.
People who aren’t polite.
Complicated, chaotic, messy.
A pair of Back to the Future shoes. They were auctioned off for Michael J Fox’s Parkinson’s charity, so I bid and I won. I am a huge fan of the films and if there was ever a pair of shoes I should own, it was those.
I’m afraid of the dark.
Very complicated.
More on time & hindsight
- What is the most important lesson life has taught you? 137 answers
- What advice would you give your twenty-year-old self, and what should they ignore? 77 answers
- What scares you about getting older? 61 answers
- What is the best advice you have ever received? 28 answers
- If you could have a gigantic billboard anywhere, what would it say and why? 23 answers
- What is something you were told by a parent, teacher, or mentor that you still repeat to yourself? 22 answers
Also answered this
Adam Kay, Chris McCausland, Samuel L Jackson, Bill Maher, Ricky Gervais, Bear Grylls
Search the directory for somebody in particular.
Explore further
- All time & hindsight questions
- The The Q&A questionnaire — 25 questions from the same format
- Explore the archive — by field, age, era, and subject