J W's Memories

 

J W aged 6

Contributor

 

J W aged 16

Contributor

I tried to write it more about the times I’ve lived through than about the way I felt, but now I’m hazy not just about dates, but even the order of some events!

I was made redundant from Roche in 1992 (my wife tells me – I’d only just married her in 1990, after 14 years of living together) and started work with L. 3 months later. 11 years after that, they went into administration and I therefore started Business Writing Associates in 2003.

I learned to fly gliders in about 1973 (I took my elder son who would have been about 17) and started to learn power flying sometime between 2003 and 2005. (I didn’t finish the course).

My work with both my previous companies had given me many contacts in the industries involved and I’d been charged with dealing with the agency L. used for advertising. So I was able quite quickly to build a client base for copywriting.

My USP was my intimate knowledge of some industries, pharmaceuticals, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, building, architecture and associated works and in leisure pursuits I was an offshore yachtmaster, glider pilot, badminton player and erstwhile schoolboy athlete.

I therefore didn’t need the detailed briefing that a journalist without such knowledge needed from the client – if I stuck to those fields. I tried to stop work when I was 67, but a few clients wouldn’t let me. It was much more difficult working 2-3 days a week, than full time!

At 88 I’ve stopped my charity work, except I’m still ‘Reading for the blind’ for Talking Newspapers.