I know it may seem hard for some of my readers to comprehend but I was once "a quiet one" and in many respects still am. I don't go out of my way to avoid conflict in the things I believe in but I would much rather lead a quiet life. But the role I have adopted doesn't allow me to do that.
I have an inner believe and wish to do something when I think things are wrong. I have often been in both my professional and also voluntary careers put in a place where I have had to sit in judgement of others. This may have been by way of doing work appraisals or as part of interview panels for the appointment of people to various positions.
And the people I hate interviewing are the blusterers. You will have come across them. They tell you how brilliant they are and show an arrogance that many feel to be attractive. Let's take a job interview situation. I know people are expected to push themselves forward in job interviews, but how many times have you seen somebody appointed to a position because they "talk a good game" but then, when appointed, deliver very little? These are blusterers with little substance.
The problem is many believe their boasts. When doing interviews I have always looked for enthusiastic people who may be much quieter and more loathe to tell the world how great they are. These are the non blusterers with substance.
I guess this all comes back to two sporting incidents at secondary school. You will all be aware of my love of watching and playing sport. There are some sports that I consider I am decent at - tennis being the primary one. I was also as a youngster a reasonable cricketer, hockey player and footballer. I would say I'm very average at table tennis, athletics and squash and there are sports that I'm useless at (swimming and golf come to mind).
So at secondary school under the watchful eye of a Norfolk coach and a member of staff, I made first of all the Junior and then the Senior tennis team. Then the coach moved on and the member of staff left for another school. As I've said I was a quiet kind of person and never one to push myself forward firmly believing, as I still do, that my actions would speak for me rather than what came out of my mouth.
But the new member of staff who took over the running of the school tennis didn't know me and so I found myself playing with the group of people who could barely hit the ball over the net. How could this happen I hear you say? I have no idea but it did. I can't remember whether I or anyone else pointed out that I had represented the school at tennis. I presume not because I started not turning up for games. The ultimate result was that I refused to play tennis for a good two years before taking the game up again.
The same happened in football. We had a member of staff who was a keen footballer. I made the school team and in one particular match scored four goals despite playing in midfield. He said I was the school's Alan Ball which was a heck of a compliment if you have ever watched Alan Ball play.
Then he left and a prefect took over the organising of school football. Again he didn't know me, again I was one of the quiet ones and again I found myself relegated to playing with the kids who had difficulty kicking a ball let along running with it.
I think this time somebody did say something and I was back in the big game. I have to say there have only been two occasions when I have gone out to deliberately hurt someone on the football pitch. As soon as that prefect got the ball I deliberately pulled him down with a two footed tackle. Thankfully I didn't hurt him much. The only other time was when I did a reckless tackle on a school bully who I had seen mistreating some friends. Again I didn't really hurt him.
From those two incidents I have always looked for substance in quieter people. Looked beyond the bluster and boasts. Sitting here writing this I can think of a handful of people who have gone from top job to top job without ever showing any ability whatsoever. They must have talked a good talk.
Funnily enough a couple of days ago somebody mention the MP Chris Grayling - need I say more?
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Yesterday I asked a question about my T-shirt which bore the words: "Hulme Hall, Port Sunlight - Rock n Roll. The Beatles Live. Saturday Aug 18th 1962."
The answer to the conundrum is that this was the first time drummer Ringo Starr appeared live with the Beatles. The rest, as they say, is history. Ringo only had a two hour rehearsal before taking to the stage at 10 pm. It's a strange fact that the occasion was the local horticultural society's annual dance. The hall's capacity was supposed to be 450 but they crammed 500 in for that gig. Not sure how much room that left for dancing.
A few years ago we took the bus to Port Sunlight -so called because of its association with Sunlight Soap. It's not far from Liverpool and was founded by William Lever in 1888. The village was built to house Sunlight Soap factory workers. Today its a village almost captured in time with an art gallery, parkland, museum and, of course, slice of Beatles history.