I've realised that these pages may be more interesting to me than I thought as, if I go back through the archives, I can see how so many plans were made and then failed to happen. However, I don't view this as a failure on my part. I don't think that the opposite of succeeding is being a failure. In my eyes, a failure would never even try. It simply means you have to try again, take another route or do something different. But you must never give up on trying to do something.

On 4th December 2020, the 39th anniversary of my father's death, feeling a little introspective, I decided the time had come for me to retire. By 5th December I fully realised I did not know from what I was retiring. For the last 38 years I have been involved in some way in helping others to learn and to better themselves. That is why my latest venture, Owlbut's World of Learning website, is there. Producing it has been a massive task. I am incredibly proud of the site and have no intention of stopping it now. I also love taking, and in some cases selling, my photographs and, indeed, working on the website has moved me back into video production, on a small scale. Luckily I no longer need two TV, two video recorders and a mass of wires nor, even more luckily and going back even further, do I need a reel of 8mm film, a splicer and some film cement. Nevertheless there is much I need to learn of this new way of doing things. I didn't want that to stop either

So, on reflection, I think the only thing I am retiring from is my dream of making a fourth journey trough England and putting the material I would film on the learning website. Whilst the journey would be amazing, seeing places I last saw 36 years ago and noting the changes, the planning, the looking for funding and the need, as I saw it, to have a colleague to work with, was never enjoyable. I am basically a lone worker and that is how I gain most pleasure from my work and how I am at my happiest.

That then is my retirement. To be honest I have also pulled out of a few commitments I had working with some wonderful teachers around the world and I would like to say thank you to all of them for enjoying my work, making use of my work and keeping me sane.

2021 therefore starts differently from any of the last 10 years with a major plan, nay dream, put to one side. It wasn't a failure, it just didn't succeed. Oh, does put to one side mean it might still happen one day. Is this retirement not completely permanent. Never say never and never give up and, in that vein, this has been a consolidating and planning month. See you at the end of February, probably still in lockdown.