Sometimes things happen as they should

Yesterday I had one of those days of which not much is expected – I had one or two things to occupy me, viz. a phone interview to conduct, an errand to carry out, an article to complete and three phone calls to make – and initially things didn’t quite happen as they should but then, from the moment I ‘came to’ after my post-lunch nap, they not only began to work out but then a series of mini home-runs occurred and by the time I had retired to bed I did so with a rare sense that for once I had spent a satisfactory twelve hours before the mast.

Let me expand.

Upon firing up the computer in the morning I found waiting in my in-box an email of thanks from an acquaintance in my field of research for the arrival of a copy of a book that I had written nearly a decade ago now but had just sent him.

Please excuse my ego here, but during the course of the day, in breaks between going about my business, I decided to pick up a copy of said tome and flick through it for the sole purpose of trying to imagine the impression it might be making upon the fellow who had just received a copy of it.

I was pleasantly surprised by my own efforts – that is to say, I found it a reasonably enjoyable and interesting read. In fact I so enjoyed it that, by the time I went to bed, I had read (or rather re-read) about two-thirds of it.

Smug self-satisfaction was not my only reaction.

Partly no doubt prompted by the fact I wrote it so long ago that – and my short-term memory now being as bad as it is – I couldn’t remember great swathes of it, but I was impressed by the quality of its content and the language used to the point that I couldn’t imagine being able to compose anything so apparently learned now even if I tried. That thought on its own was both sobering and served to keep my feet on the ground, as it were.

My errand having been carried out satisfactorily, I then prepared for my phone interview and was primed to spring into action, notebook and research to hand, at the appointed hour.

An hour later I was still waiting. The call never came and the interview never happened.

I had some lunch and then retired for my post-prandial nap.

An hour and a half later I returned to my computer only to receive a call from one of those I was schedule to call myself. That conversation lasted about half an hour and was entirely positive. Afterwards I wrote an email to my brother – who was waiting for my response -containing a summary of what had been agreed. Job done.

Next I received an email from someone I had written to asking for contact details of the chairman of a lunch I had recently attended. He had come back with the required email and phone number information, so I pumped out an email to said chairman whom for present purposes I shall refer to as ‘A’.

I was about to make my second scheduled phone call when the prospective interviewee of my early failed ‘phone interview’ rang me, apologising profusely for not calling when he should.

Clearing my decks, I then conducted my interview with him – a fascinating and rewarding experience. Immediately the call finished, I opened my relevant ‘working document’ and typed into it the notes I had made whilst conducting the interview. Again, job done.

Towards the conclusion of the above-mentioned exercise, I received another phone call.

This was from A, who had now read my earlier email to him. He was keen to help me with my quest to trace a particular WW1 soldier who may have played for his sporting club over a century ago. I agreed to send him particulars of both said solider and the project upon which I was working that related to him.

That was my next task, accomplished once I had finished knocking out the notes of my earlier phone interview.

By now it was rising 6.00pm – I had done nearly all that I had intended to do and, in terms of tracing my ‘missing’ WW1 soldier, had actually got further than I had hoped. Time to relax and make myself an evening snack. Afterwards I watched a bit of television, i.e. a package of highlights of the Winter Olympics in which I am not really interested but which served as a suitable background ‘moving wallpaper’ whilst I continued ploughing through my own book.

Bedtime occurred – as usual – not long after 8.30pm. As I slipped beneath my duvet and into the land of slumber a live commentary upon the Liverpool soccer match was playing on Radio Five Live.

Time passed.

At eight minutes to midnight I then awoke again and rose to begin my ‘night shift’.

After making myself a vat of black coffee and firing up my computer, I went straight to my email account. Waiting for me was an excited missive from A.

Not only had he discovered that my missing WW1 soldier had indeed played for his rugby club, in their archives he had found details of his playing records and also a copy of a team photograph in which he appears!

As I mentioned in my opening paragraph, my ‘waking hours yesterday’  had not been a totally unproductive twelve hours after all …