Prologue 

‘Just Get On With It’

I finally started to write this book in April 2019 although for at least a decade I’d been telling anyone who cared to listen that I’d be embarking on such a task the year before; in fact immediately after I had retired in 2018.   Whether friends, family and colleagues viewed this as a whim that might never get off the ground, or were mildly curious about the possible content, I’m fairly sure they were becoming fed up with hearing about the prospective project.

‘Just get on with it’ was doubtless the general consensus

Over the subsequent three years, as its slowly taken shape, I have been regularly chipping in during  conversations that touched on some of the topics covered in the book with what by now are familiar and probably irritating comments assuring the listener that ‘I’ve got a chapter on this subject’ or ‘I mentioned that episode in my book.’

Now at least, if anyone inquires about how the book’s coming along I can say with a bit of a relieved sigh that it’s done.

So what’s it all about?

It’s a story, or more accurately a series of short stories, that attempt to paint a picture of my life:  and it’s not just about me; it also encompasses events and environment, people and philosophies.  Thoughts, experiences friendships, opinions, inspirations, successes and failures, likes and dislikes will all be in there.

It doesn’t follow the normal strict chronological format of a typical biography.  It’s rather random, but hopefully the vague time-line provides a common thread to hang things on.  It’s more of a dip-and-dive ride across the decades that takes in the spheres, senses, sounds and sights that I’ve encountered along the way and form part of a kaleidoscope of experiences that I hope will be interesting.  A few of the thoughts or observations aren’t my own; I’ve heard or read them somewhere and happily acknowledge the, often unknown, originator.  In other words I’ve sometimes shamelessly plagiarised off the back of others who can express themselves far better than me.

Why ‘Time Traveller?’

The notion of Time is intriguing; the non-stop line that traces the journey of everything and everybody from an infinite past to an infinite future.  I joined this ‘time- travelling’  trip over sixty years ago and over that tiny span of years have evolved from chubby baby via lithe teenager and robust adult to a somewhat creaking pensioner.  Barely three generations during which the huge changes to society, technology and environment have accompanied the travels of me and my friends, family and colleagues.  

But it’s so much more than that.  We’re just the current baton carriers for a group of us on a much longer expedition.  One that stretches back, linked by the genes in every one of our cells, to ancestors who roamed the savannah hundreds of millennia ago.  The time spans are hard to get your head around and that’s before you even start to contemplate our association with to all those lifeforms that have come before, or the four billion plus year existence of our planet.

The book moves up and down this time line stopping now and then to visit a theme, an incident, a memory, or a topic of interest to me. I also think this walk through my life probably confirms those words written fifty years ago by a somewhat more imaginative character than me. 

'Time may change me, but I can't change Time.'

It wasn’t written in any particular order and the sequence was more influenced by whatever was in my mind, or I particularly fancied doing at that time.  Over the three- plus years it‘s probably possible to spot a change in style, and maybe even some improvement in technique or approach.  Undoubtedly some of the chapters are over-long and self-indulgent whilst others are too short to really do the memory, or subject, justice.  And I still keep being reminded of other incidents, memories, ideas and opinions; triggered by something someone mentions, an article I read, a song I hear and so on.  In fact I’d never get around to finishing it if I didn’t draw a line somewhere.

So that’s what I’ve done today; the last day of 2022.  Done.

It is what it is.

December 2022