IF I COULD TURN BACK TIME

By johanne James

Hello ladies and gentlemen. How was your week? I hope you are all well?

If I could turn back time. 
What would you do if you could? What would you change, correct or not do at all? If I could turn back time, I’d meet Cher and ask, oh never mind. Anyway, there are too many things to mention, but I’ll make a very short list of that which I would.

1. I would most definitely take up playing ice hockey instead of football. As I have mentioned many times that it’s the best game in the world, painful at times it may be, but the skill one has to acquire to simply stay on your feet let alone control a 3 inch black rubber cylinder at the end of a four to five stick without being hit by a 16 stone juggernaut is, well, let’s put it this way, you wouldn’t want to see the inside of an ambulance, would you?

2. I would muster up the courage to ask the young lady whom I had such a crush on when I was 15 years old, yes I was 15 once, to the school disco/dance, am I being old fashioned by saying disco? She shall of course remain nameless as I wouldn’t want her husband breaking down my door with an axe screaming “Here’s Johnny”! Sound familiar? Who knows what might have been? I may not be writing these columns and life could have taken a totally different turn. Hmm? The mind boggles, well it would, IF I HAD ONE!!

3. And at number 3, not taken that job from Adam & Eve close to Shepherd’s Bush. This was when I had decided to take my life in my hands as mentioned in a previous column, when I was a London motorcycle courier. Missing my turn and deciding to carry on straight nearly cost me my life, and has haunted me ever since! I should have turned right, but then I went straight ahead and into hospital. Three days later I emerged with my arm in plaster and my bike in bits. Quite literally, in bits. How on earth did I get out of that alive? I’m sure we all have a list of that which we would change for the better. But how would you know that turning back time to correct any mistake, wouldn’t lead to something else that you would want to turn back time and change again. Consequently we would spend the rest of our lives changing everything we’ve done only to make things worse. Some memories erode in time and others haunt us for the rest of our lives, but how we live with is the challenge. Life is the shape it is for a purpose, I found. I take the utmost care not to make the same mistake twice! But he who never made a mistake, never made anything worthy of being called worthy. Look back and be wise. Look forward and be wiser.

Thanks for listening.

Johanne James