It's a new year, a new day

Somewhere in my many boxes of photos are just two photos of my wedding. Graham and I posed in front of this fireplace, signing the register. When I started work at the Greater Manchester County Record Office back in April 2013, I went to a meeting in this room. At that meeting was one of the partners for Archives+, the partnership I am working with, Marion Hewitt of the North West Film Archive. She was one of the witnesses at that wedding back in June 1984.The only other guest and witness was the often missed Maryann Gomez. I really felt that my life had turned the full circle of a spiral, and that twisting, turning ,spiralling feeling has stayed with me through 2013. Now we have arrived at 2014. The year I turn 60. The year I have to start job hunting again, after the lovely gap year of the traineeship in Manchester. I have five more years to do before I can retire. By retire, I mean when I might have time to be able do the things I want to do, so it's important that I continue to chase the paid work that answers some of those interests. Last night my son was playing at one of the pubs in Bakewell. He's the singer with a covers band called the Vipers. I hadn't seen them play since the summer, so decided to go to the first set. I then headed round to my mum's to see the new year in with her. My dad died in the early hours of new year's day in 2010, so it's a strange time. He loved a good new year's eve do and we often had gatherings at our house in Eccles.He was a great host and a good cook. After he went to work in the far east the style of our celebrations changed. Last night set me thinking about some of the New Year's Eves I have known. As a teenager I spent one hallucinating - not on drugs but with some sort of tropical fever. As 1971 became 1972 I rang the bells in a private chapel at East Down Manor outside Barnstaple. I was there with 8th Day friends, Mike and Jenny Slaughter, Brian Livingstone and Ross. We were invited to spend New Year with the Edgar Broughton Band and their friends and families. They were there recording a new album in a country pile. We went to the local pub. The local landed gentry had the unlikely name of Pyne Coffin.it was a magical end to a nightmarish few months and a meaningful new start to a new year. I was in Casablanca ten years later, listening to the ships in the port hoot the new year in. Ten years on from that, and new year plans were upset by a poorly daughter. Almost ten years on from there and it was millennium year. Lots of teenagers with us, walking home from a big family party in Over Haddon in the frosty early hours. One year I was home alone with a new baby. A couple of times I had impromptu parties for those of us who couldn't find or afford babysitters, with children welcome. Ten years on and my dad reached the end of his life in the early hours of New Year's Day, holding my mother's hand to the end. It was a full moon that night, a perfect New Year's Eve for a family get together, with memories of other times he had been the host. Back to last night. I didn't expect to hear Charlie's voice ringing over Bakewell as I walked home from my mum's but it made me feel that 2014 is one to look forward to.