Well, how did that happen? How on Earth can I shortly be starting my seventh decade on this aforementioned planet? Yes, January 16th, will be my 60th birthday! Whatever happened to that handsome young man in the photograph, getting ready to read the news on BBC Radio? That was in 1981 when I was a mere 25. Gulp! That’s 35 years ago. I’ll tell you what happened to him. A change of career, eight books, one wife, two children, a number of budgies, getting ill and getting better, a few cars (yes, yes, yes, I won’t go on), that’s what happened to him. |
There are compensations, though: with age comes wisdom. Seriously. I’m wiser than I was back then. No, stop laughing. I know that’s not saying much, given the original raw material way back when, but I am. I know now that when I thought I knew it all in those lazy, hazy, crazy days of long ago, I actually knew nothing. So knowing now that I knew nothing then makes me wiser. Doesn’t it?
Also I’m a much calmer person than I was then, and I no longer care what the world thinks of me. But how the world has changed in that time. In the days of that photo the studio equipment of turntables, reel-to-reel tape and faders, was absolutely state of the art. But it’s probably languishing in some broadcasting museum at the moment, as all programmes are driven by computer now.
Talking of computers, I first started using one in 1989; was almost reduced to tears of frustration as I was unable to control the first mouse to be introduced to my work station in 1992; and felt on top of the world when I invested in my first home computer in 1997. A great monstrosity of a thing it was, all £1,000 worth of it, for a mere 16mb of RAM.
OK, reminiscing over. Nostalgia back in the drawer for another 35 years. Jeez, I'll be 95!