ALL IN THE HEAD 1

A DAY WITH ME

On the nineteenth day of March in the most pleasant of years 1987, I became a big brother for the sixth and final time. Now having three younger brothers and three younger sisters, while still having just under two months to go before my thirteenth birthday was to come round, my world was about to, if it hadn't already, become quite hectic. On a very odd but pleasant day in 2009 my world would be rocked by something quite peculiar.

In 1987 and having seven children under the age of thirteen, it of course wasn't easy for my mum to get out of the house while my dad was at work, so with myself being indeed being the eldest of those seven siblings, I would be entrusted with a regular set up.

Times back then weren't what they are now with the likes of direct debits, home grocery deliveries and the likes so mum would give me money and I would have a routine of going out to pay the bills and do the shopping, and in previous years and continuing on in this one, I also had the pleasure (yeah right) of changing nappies and feeding bottles on a regular basis to all four of my youngest siblings and then to a next generation when that came along.

None of this was ever a problem for me, if anything I had and always have been proud and happy to be the big brother. All these things I had in my life were what they were; they were just a part of life, indeed my life and despite all the ensuing mayhem, it was a happy life. I wouldn't have changed it for the world.

Having lived in the same town ever since I was three years old, I have seen the changes that have been made here; it is definitely not the same town in the 2020's as it was in 1987. Back then there was no enormous central town shopping center; the hospital which exists today wasn't even a daydream. Back in the eighties there was no bowling alley, no town hotels of which by 2009 there were five, the park area near the village was nothing more than a few football fields, and even the old village itself now is very different place to what it was.

The old town center which had served the town for decades is long gone, a road now passes through where that old building used to be, the old supermarket with the chemist and post office at its side is also long gone, having turned into apartments a few years after the new, or newer, town center opened. The old footbridge I had crossed thousands of times in my teens has been replaced with a new or at least newer and quite impressive looking bridge.

So, 2009 comes along. You know, I like to believe that the universe sometimes likes to open itself up every once in a while, and with the endless possibilities it possesses it can bring space and time together to offer out a gift or two, a gift so special it reminds us of who we are and of whom we once were.

On a particular day indeed in 2009 I was out walking, nothing strange about this as I like to go walking quite a bit, but on this unusual day something very strange indeed was to happen. Yeah, it was the oddest experience I have ever experienced and looking back upon it now I see it as my gift from the universe, a gift for me and to me.

Out on this walk of mine I was hit with a sudden spell of dizziness and hit so hard by it that it knocked me off my feet and to the ground. Apparently, I wasn't the only one to feel this dizziness, well maybe I was, I guess it is all a matter of how you can look at this odd and unique moment. As I got to my feet, a young boy only a few feet away, also got up to his feet after also having fallen, this boy? This boy ... he was me ... is me ... when I was thirteen years of age. Can you believe that? Well, it's true, not one word this tale of a lie.

The regular me at this particular moment in time as this story enfolds was thirty-five years old.

Even though I was a very different looking person at thirty-five years of age to what I looked like when I was thirteen, my younger self somehow seemed to know he was looking into his own future. He was not only looking into his future, but he was also there in an actual future moment of time. He had come to be in the present rather than thirty-five-year-old me travelling to a past.