I can remember as a lad speculating about my place within the world. Not in the manner that I would (and still do) in later years. It was much more ponderous than searching.

As a nine-year old I had no grasp of science (I still don’t) but I did know that people were made of lots of tiny bits of stuff, and that these little bits of stuff all had jobs to do, to make sure we could function properly.

All that I knew about the world at this tender age was that it revolved round me. But even within this self-centric point of view, I began to wonder that if I was made up of lots of bits of little wonderful stuff, perhaps I was an equally little and brilliant bit of stuff in something much, much bigger.

My inclination at the time was that I was a little cell, and that the earth was a bigger thing, joined up to all the other planets that formed a much bigger part of a giant person, who back then I imagined as a footballer. I wondered about this huge person, playing with other big people, going about their day.

So earthquakes could be explained by the footballer falling over, and hurricanes by him farting…

Since my

mid-teens, I’ve searched for my place within the world. At times the illusiveness of any certain answer fills me with discontent. It was during one of these moments recently, that I picked up a book with a contender for ‘Most ambitious title of all time’, The Meaning of Life.

Needless to say it didn’t live up to this lofty claim, and so utterly bored by the first three pages, my mind began to wander, until it stumbled upon my memory of the giant footballer, and my role in keeping him at his best.

I couldn’t help but think that perhaps as a boy I was onto something that I forget all-too-quickly. With the distractions and responsibility that comes with a few more years, it’s all too easy to take the endless opportunities (or distractions?) that the world offers, and be blinded by their number when it comes to making a decision about what to do with your life.

Instead, if I thought like I did as a child, and saw the bigger picture, I’d narrow the options down, as you naturally have to consider how whatever you do will help the other little cells, keep the footballer at his best.

For me at least, this naïve little notion has kicked my dissatisfaction in to touch (for now) and is very likely the reason I’ve sat up late to type this, and put it online, where hopefully it will be of some use to another little cell, wondering how he can help the footballer (dancer/dandy/artist/builder) be even greater.