I have just started going through some old files in order to root out and bin / shred those papers I won’t been needing to accompany us on our house move in about three months.
The first section I’m tackling relates to my old ‘career’ life back in 2013 and 2014. At the time I was working for an international business based in Switzerland.
There was something romantic about the international jet-setting (for a while at least), but now I’m starting to shred receipts etc. it strikes me what an insane amount of travelling I was doing: pages and pages of acknowledgements about Manchester airport car parking, confirmation after confirmation of flight details. I was working Tuesday-Friday in Europe, which meant Monday-Friday away from home. There are vast numbers of A4 sheets documenting the routine of that life including boarding passes, hotel bills…
I confess to shock as to how blinded to it all I must have become – and I’m simultaneously grateful that it’s a lifestyle I have given up. My daily commute today is from bedroom to study!
On the other hand it was an exciting time, and I’m grateful to Rod for offering me that chance. I’m also sure I learned a lot from the experience – culminating years later in recognising that I should take the opportunity to give that life up when the chance came along.
Having said that, I have always been seduced by travel and new places; making associated discoveries was part of the reward for working away from home, I suppose.
And it occurs to me now whether there isn’t enough material in there for a new project of some kind. Perhaps a narrative which begins with someone pulling into the car park at Manchester airport – after all, I know what that feels like!
Write what you know, eh?…
Ian Gouge - Writer 