Who I Am
Here are two snippets of the author’s life that may or may not say something meaningful.
The first begins in 1960, when the English Football Association’s (soccer) Cup between Wolverhampton Wanderers and Blackburn Rovers was played at Wembley Stadium, London. As a boy living in the north-east of England, far from both Blackburn or Wolverhampton, I and all my friends had no real horse in this race. However, boys being boys, everyone was supporting ‘Wolves’, carnivores being hugely more popular than mere ‘Rovers’. Being me, I supported Blackburn. If they’d won that day, I’d have forgotten it in a week. They lost and the inevitable teasing led me to dig in and here I am today, a Blackburn Rovers supporter.
The second is similar. Some years ago, my son and three friends formed a team to take part in a 10km charity run. Then one of the team broke his collarbone and my son asked if I could take his place. At the gym I ran on a treadmill for thirty minutes as a warmup, but I’d never run for an hour outdoors. Anyhow, I agreed and week or so later, we did the run. I was so pleased with it that, 12 years later, I run 5k and 10k practices every week and take part in charity runs each summer.
The above examples are like my authoring, where I set out to write a book and now, it seems, can’t stop.
