I have very mixed feelings about playing my harmonica. I think it is just a survival thing. When I was 14 I realised I could get nowhere in life because of all the education that I had missed because of all the hospital treatment I had had due to my crippled arm, so I thought that music was a good way to go. For while it was but I completely underestimated my interest in the natural world as well as historical stuff. I only regained my interest from about age 20 on when I was living back in my home town Richmond North Yorkshire and I made friends with a young local history teacher called Tom Owen who worked in Richmond comprehensive School. I am forever grateful to him for boosting my self-esteem and helping me get to York University which I did when I was 30 years old. It was a long journey Tom but I got there.

The point of this, is that now I am nearly 54 years old, still physically handicapped but I have an additional problem which is this annoying RSI and it is a major barrier at the moment to pursuing my goal of becoming a maths teacher. Frustrating because I have home educated my eldest child to a level standard in mathematics and he is doing very well(A mathematics and he is well on to getting an A in further mathematics) but the mathematics Road appears to be closing for me. So I get interested in music again because I feel it is the only thing I can do. It's pathetic. Any job using a computer or any form of inputting with the hand is closed to me. I am practising my harmonica again and hope that I can get into a blues band, set up a duo, trio or band so I can work into my old age which is what I want to do. I am also learning countertenor singing. What I want to do best of all is be a maths teacher in a local Middlesbrough school that would be good for me, my family and the community. There are also quite a few people in the Tees Valley who I have got to know very well and would like to continue to know them for a long time.