The diary of Dad

It’s no secret that I have a terrible memory. Sadly I remember very little from my own childhood and my short term memory is even worse. I have zero sense of direction and will have to do a route approximately five thousand times before it becomes vaguely familiar.

Today I accidentally found myself taking a walk down memory lane and I realised just how much of my life I fail to remember and it really is quite worrying!

The story has a sad start, for me anyway, a trip to the dentist. I’ve been a few times and my lovely wife Sarah has always dropped me off outside the door and picked me up from the same spot when I’m finished. The dentist is in Colchester but for all I knew it may as well have been on Mars as I had no real idea of anything that was around it.

This trip was a little different though as Sarah had other business taking Robbie to school and although she was able to drop me off, I had the daunting task of finding my own way home.

As is the modern way, I turned straight to Google maps and quickly realised that there was a train station almost next door to the dentist with trains taking me straight home. Now here’s where my memory kicked in. Sort of.

I should actually know this train station very well. I have in fact worked in Colchester before, on two separate stretches, where I used this station every single day. One of these jobs was with my current company and is not a time I remember too fondly but the other feels like a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.

For around six months of my life I worked as a door to door salesman, desperately trying to sell Talk Talk internet to unsuspecting victims enjoying an afternoon at home. Every day we would meet at our offices in Colchester before moving out to whichever area whoever was in charge had apparently hit on the dartboard that day. We would then head back to Colchester and ‘debrief’ in the office before making our way home.

I have no idea what the company I worked for was called. I know it was not directly through Talk Talk as others in the company were trying to flog solar panels and other junk too. I could not remember where the office was nor did I keep contact with a single person I worked with. It is as if this stage of my life never happened.

Typically of my luck, I found that the trains run every hour and of course I had just missed one meaning that I had around 59 minutes to kill. I set about trying to find the office, thinking this would pass a little bit of time and maybe jolt my mind a little. I turned out of the dentist, took the first road and… There it was. I took a read through the company names on the office block but nothing sounded familiar. I’m slightly dubious as to just how legitimate the company was in the first place so I can’t say I was surprised not to see them there fifteen or so years later.

What I did find more shocking was that I somehow had no idea where I was despite being stood somewhere that I had been every day for months. There was no recollection of any of the surrounding shops, routes or pubs in the area. I tried racking my brain for any places that I used to enjoy at the time where I could spend the next 58 minutes. I knew that I regularly had a drink or two after work with colleagues and expected to see familiar bars but came up dry so I did what I always do, walk aimlessly.

Whilst strolling along and having a chat on the phone with Sarah, I found myself in Castle park. I realised this due to seeing a big Castle in the middle of a park and then reading a sign. I’m smart like that. As it turns out, Castle Park was the perfect place for me to pass the time as I took a walk with a nosey squirrel, watched the ducks float past and generally had a little bit of an explore.

I’m quite confident that I’ve never been to Castle Park before, though I can never be too sure! Either way, it’s now in my plans to return there with Robbie when we have a free afternoon and the sun is shining.

Perhaps it shows how I’ve changed with age. Back in those blurry days I would never have considered wasting my time walking through a park to be a pleasure. There would likely have been few alternatives in my mind other than to stop for a beer or two. How times have changed.

Maybe I need to get out a little more, spend some time walking and see if I can uncover any more previous jobs, places and experiences that have disappeared from my rather leaky brain. If I find any, I’ll let you know!

Thanks for reading my latest ramblings! If you were hoping for a more useful post about family life, I’m sorry to disappoint. You may find something a little more helpful below. Still, writing this made the train journey home fly by so it’s not a total loss for us all! Take care, Dad.