"Dear Carlos Slim"

My Mother believed everything she was told. The credibility of the source was almost immaterial, allowing her the freedom to cheerfully accept, store, and carefully curate for future repetition, all of the wisdom she was offered. She was a product typical of her generation, where elders were respected and their axioms solemnly adopted, fixed like stars in her firmament of personal opinion. "When it's gone, it's gone", she would gravely declare, whenever my hard-won pocket money was accorded the light of day. In the frequent absence of even those meagre resources, she would lovingly attempt to assuage my callow chagrin, by helpfully noting "well at least you can't spend what you don’t have". Conversely, the hopeful offering "If you don't ask.." was made all the more powerful by its truncation, subliminally obliging me to complete the idiom, "...you don't get." inevitably planting seeds of hope and possibility in my soft, fertile head. With that in mind, I decided to drop a brief line to the richest man in the world.

Carlos Slim was Mexican. His name was all silk and bandito. Like a white, fitted suit, or a long, cool cigar, for special occasions. I not only admired his name, but also the way he had journeyed in wealth terms, from nothing to astounding. Rags to riches, always affirmed assuredly, that anything and everything was possible. He was very rich. Not just wealthy rich, but Mexico rich. He was the monetary equivalent of Gulliver in Lilliput.

I wrote to ask him for a loan, rather than a gift and was careful with my wording to stress that distinction. Unsure of how much he would be willing to part with, especially on my vague and somewhat flimsy terms, I suggested twenty thousand pounds, which came with a written guarantee that it was absolutely definitely going to be repaid, at some time in the future, when I was older. This sounded both mutually and ultimately reasonable, which is always an important consideration in these sorts of negotiations. I was also mindful to request pounds over pesos, as I felt the numbers involved, expressed in local currency might be visually overwhelming when written in a letter, even for a gentleman of his means. It was certainly all the money I would ever need and would provide ample funds for the long list of lifestyle improvements I was constructing. I was also fairly certain that this was not an amount of money that the good Mr. Slim would really ever miss, nor trouble his number one status.

It was far easier to write the letter than to accurately direct it. For a man with such a high public profile, in terms of an actual address, it was not easy to pin the post code tail on Carlos Slim's donkey. I resolved to contact the Mexican Embassy in London. Not only were they bound to know, but they would likely be thrilled and delighted to forward my communiqué, to the splendid mansion of their favourite son. After all, Mexico hadn't really had cause to celebrate very much since the Alamo.

My covering memo to the excellently named "His Excellency José Juan de Olloqui y Labastida", was short and concise. On the contrary, I imagined the Mexican Ambassador himself, to be a long, bird-like and elegantly roomy person, perhaps like his calling card. I also added mentally that he was probably quite busy, so I enclosed the letter within another letter, asking the embassy staff to make a note of my address and to please pass on my subtly accented "Important communication for the immediate attention of your most famous citizen, Sr. Carlos Slim"

The wait weighed heavily on me. Days became weeks, became months. I worried myself with a variety of scenarios whereby the post office ship carrying my missive was attacked by pirates or lost with all hands, in a mid-atlantic storm.

The reply took almost six months to arrive back, and to compound the injustice of so slothful a postal service, the package languished for a further two days on the mantlepiece, watching us, watching it. We didn't receive a great deal of mail from foreign embassies, so the curiosity aroused by the totally splendid manilla envelope, was understandable. The line of family questioning directed at me, the addressee, was mainly confined to the precise nature of my business with the government of Mexico.

The package was comfortingly bulky and of a suitable weight, suggesting to me that the good Mr Slim had, in fact, sensibly sent cash. With us all sat at the breakfast table, my Dad soberly offered up the bacon scissors, and thus it was carefully snipped open, taking great pains not to damage the contents. From its padded insides, I removed a crisp white envelope and a smart black notebook, which smelled of expensive new shoes, bound with a tricoloured ribbon, the green, white and red of Mexico adding an elegant, snappy garnish. I placed the envelope to one side and looked closely at the leather-bound hardback.

It was such a tidy little notebook. As tidy as I had ever seen. I held it fast to my nose, savouring a scent of delicious cedar-soaked cow dung. Each page was lined with the thinnest of gold threads, ensuring order and legibility. It was probably what Carlos Slim used to write down all of his plans, and perhaps even his shopping list.

The unsealed envelope bore forth an International Money Order made out to me, in my name, to the sum of twenty thousand pounds. The very same amount I had requested. It was as joyous as I could have ever imagined. There was also a letter, folded so finely, it would not lie flat on the kitchen table. The writing greeted me by name and bid, in elegant cursive, that I use the loan wisely, whilst keeping a judicious and detailed record of any and all adventures the funds might underwrite. There was an additional request that the completed journal, along with the loan repayment, would be returned at the appropriate time, to the keeping of Mr Slim, for which, the letter assured, he would be very grateful.

The communication was all very classy and the associated conditions entirely reasonable. We understood each other. It was a deal. I emptied what remained in the corflakes box into my breakfast bowl, knowing with an unfamiliar, but absolute certainty, from where the next box of cornflakes was coming.

Thirty years later, I am reading an email from Carlos Slim and his lovely wife Soumaya, gratefully acknowledging receipt of a worn and ink-weathered little black notebook. They expressed their joy in learning of the travels and experiences that had shaped my life-journey this far. It spoke of Japan and the rich, perfumed colours of life in South-East Asia. The aching, gaping pain of 9/11 and the philosophies of loss. The unbearable stranglehold that regrets can have. It told tales around my dark days of dependence, the pain of not feeling enough and the journey back to light. The people I helped, the lives I had changed.

They also thanked me for returning a money order, made out in my name for the sum of twenty thousand pounds. The ink was now barely visible, worn lovingly away, by the fingers of maybe.