Most of my earliest memories are related to a garden. I grew up four miles outside of Cairo in open countryside, and I didn’t go to any kind of school until I came to England aged 12. Until then I’d spent most of my time communing in an atavistic way with eucalyptus trees.

I got into writing almost by accident. The present generation of young writers do creative writing MAs. None of that existed for my generation – we just beavered away on our own.

I still cry thinking of my husband. He passed away in 1998. We’d been married for 41 years. He was an academic and we gave each other space – but only for short periods of time. I’ve adjusted to being alone and I’m fortunate in that I have a confederacy of family and friends around me, but I still miss him.

Age isn’t something you slam into in the middle of the night. It gathers over time. I’m exactly the same person I’ve always been, but I’m now in a different body that has betrayed me. I do, in a curious way, feel ambushed.

I am of the pre-Pill generation. My friends and I spent a lot of our teen years watching the calendar and worrying.

Love is the most betraying of human emotions because you can do nothing about it. It’s wonderful, but it’s also terrifying because it’s out of our control.

Class is based on money now. It used to be immediately visible: you could tell a lot about a person by the way they dressed and spoke.

I was starstruck by William Golding [author of Lord of the Flies]. I met him a few times and I was so in awe that I could never find anything to say beyond hello. I’d become completely dumbstruck, but I doubt he noticed.

Try everything and do everything. There’s nothing sadder than passing up opportunities. I feel proudest of the times when I’ve taken a risk and said yes to something outside of my comfort zone.

I wish I believed in the supernatural. I’ve spent my life living in old houses and I wouldn’t mind having been visited by a ghost at some point – that would have been extremely interesting. I’m either ghostproof or they didn’t think I was worth talking to.

I’m the worst navigator in the world. My grandchildren say: “Never have Granny reading the map” and it’s true – you could end up in Switzerland on my watch.

My greatest regret is not having had a third child. I had two and they’re wonderful, but I just have this feeling there was somebody else around that should have been with us. The ghost of the child I didn’t have.

Ammonites and Leaping Fish by Penelope Lively is published by Penguin on 7 August at £9.99. To order a copy for £7.99 with free UK p&p go to theguardian.com/bookshop or call 0330 333 6846