An old man in Sunderland who owned the Universe. And kept it in a jam-jar in a dusty cupboard under the stairs.

The sun was just rising when a teaspoon clang-clang-clanged around the inside of his second cup of tea of the day.  Norman Aitkinson had always been an early riser, it was a habit that was hard to shake after eighty-seven years.  As a younger man he’d rose for his job in an accountancy firm, a firm owned by his father, and there was a benefit to being an early bird.  But now when he got up in the morning it was before the sun and he would wake his neighbours with lawn mowing or whatever other task he could find for himself to while away the long morning hours.  He sipped his tea and felt the little aches and twinges in his arm as it raised the cup.  His rheumatic bones were suffering in the cold weather.  He stood at his kitchen bunker and watched the blurred bird shapes catching worms in his back garden.  The grass was a hazy green oblong, he couldn’t tell if it needed cut or not.  It could wait until Spring, if he was still around then.  Norman drained the tea from
his mug and washed it, clanking it onto the draining board.  It was time to check the jar.