Retreaded, not retired

Because I’ve turned eighty, people assume I’m retired. Nothing could be further from the truth – I’m in the middle of a career I started when I was sixty six. I may have stopped scraping for coal in a hole (doon the pit) but I now work at putting words on a page. Six books are on sale, one with the printers and number eight is laid out and about a quarter drafted. I started in journalism and met a host of facinating people. I shook hands with Bishop Tutu, interviewed an ex Springbok rugby captain and a cabinet minister. I sailed in an America’s Cup boat and interviewed a man who was at the sinking of the Bismark. What am I proudest of? I wrote up the interview with the Bismark chap and he read it to his family, saying it was how he’d wanted to tell them his story for sixty years. Retired? Retreaded maybe, but not out to pasture.
Sullatober