JM
When my mother let me stay home from school even though I wasn't ill.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 13 June 2009 source ↗
The question
What period or moment in your life brought you the most joy?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.
Others on this question
View all 577 →
Shappi Khorsandi
Iranian-born British comedian
Right now. Ask me again when my children are grown, and I’ll sob, “When they loved me more than that woman/man they’ve shacked up with.”
Sam Shepard
American playwright and actor
Before I was born.
Every time one of my kids was born and I knew that they were healthy.
June Brown
English actress and author
Childhood, up until the age of seven, when my sister died.
More from Jay McInerney
View profile →That my critics remain healthy, despite violent attacks of spleen.
More on time & hindsight
- What lesson has mattered most in your life? 138 answers
- What counsel would you give your twenty-year-old self — and what should they ignore? 78 answers
- What worries you about getting older? 61 answers
- What counsel has proved most valuable to you? 28 answers
- If you could put a message on a giant billboard, what would it say and why? 25 answers
- What line from a parent, teacher, or mentor do you still repeat to yourself? 23 answers
Also answered this
Malorie Blackman, Kathy Lette, Margaret Atwood, Jane Asher, Julian Clary, Joanna Scanlan
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