I suppose it's because I have so much time on my hands these days that all these memories come flooding back to me.

Once again I find myself in front of this screen with no connection to the net¹ and, although it might be hard to believe, I have found that there is not a lot I can do without the connection. I could go and play games, I suppose, but I cannot help thinking what a waste of technology that is really, especially for the amount of money I spent buying and upgrading this computer.

I feel cut off from all my friends that I have made on several sites throughout the past few years since I came on line. I feel like there is
something missing. Yet when I think back to the days when I never even had a computer, let alone one with access to the internet, I wonder what I did to pass the time. The answer to that must have been just watching television. There was a time, and it seems so long ago now, when we were living in a small caravan with only a small portable television and a radio. Mind you, we had just met back then and we had both sacrificed a lot to be together, both financially and emotionally.

I had just been made redundant from my job after my return from working in Russia and was lucky enough to be kept on for a few extra months to finish off a module that the company were building for an oil company out in the North Sea. We only came back up north to sell the house that I had shared with my ex wife and children, collect my
half of the money from the sale and move back down south again. The only problem was that larger houses were not selling too well at that time, so we were stuck in a bad situation and, to make matters worse, winter was about to set in. Yet, despite all that, I had never been as happy in
my life before as I was back then. I had met someone who wanted me, the person, and not the large pay cheque at the end of the month. Mind you, I should have known that really but, then again, I never knew my ex-wife could be so mercenary. When we discussed the break up all she
worried about was the material things and not a thought of how it would affect our kids. Mind you, they were not kids as such at the time as one was in her early twenties and the other in the last of her teens.

So there we were, my new partner and I, living in a small touring caravan with the onset of a northern winter drawing in. Yet we were both happy just to be together and, I must admit, we still are nearly thirteen years later. We have come a long way since then and have been through some really tough and demanding times, yet we made it. Looking
back on it now to those early years, when we went through all that, and when you consider that we were then what they call middle-aged - early forties for me and late thirties for my partner - we stuck together and saw things through. This is more than I can say for some couples who get married these days, who tend to give up at the first hurdle.

One thing I do remember from those days is that when you get divorced you seem to lose all the so-called friends you had beforehand and find yourself mixing with people in the same situation as you. Second-time-rounders was the term used for folk like us. So we found ourselves with these new friends and sharing all the problems that we had in common which, looking back on it now, was a good thing as we understood and appreciated the problems that they had.

In the end we had to use all the money I had left over to buy a static caravan to spend the winter in which, I must admit, was far more comfortable, albeit with the condensation and frozen water pipes. In fact, we spent yet another cold winter there before eventually moving back south after selling the house for a lot less than it was worth, but that was just another experience to add to all the others that we had.

So, looking back on it now, I never even had a computer let alone access to the internet. In fact I had never even heard of the internet until I heard my work mates talking about it in my new job. I used to listen to them as they chatted away about things like downloading, surfing and other terminologies that I never even understood at the
time. It was like a totally new language to me - one that I could not understand - so, like many others, we ridiculed those who talked about it. After buying my first computer and going online I gradually began to understand a lot of the new language I had heard earlier and, when I come to think about it, learning about relationships is the same as
learning about computers; you have to put a lot into it to gain the best results.

You have to listen and learn, try to understand and be prepared to ask questions to gain further knowledge. It's a gradual thing. You can't expect to be an expert overnight, you have to grow to appreciate what you have learnt and take it in small stages. Every day there is something new to learn and you can never say that you know it all as,
just like life, there are new challenges coming at you all the time and you have to be prepared to take them on.

I suppose the final item on the list is to be sure that you download the latest version and be capable of installing it - and make sure you check the recycle bin before you delete the contents! All of the above terminologies are well understood by computer buffs and could be translated into human relationships as well.

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