My life was as ordinary as any ordinary life could be up to the age of about seven. I had an experience I neither had the understanding nor concept of that would unknowingly change the entire direction, motivation and course of my life. It was late summer, 1975, and I was home alone on an overcast afternoon. In 1975, the world was a very different place. Kids played for hours outside on the street. It was a playing field of innocence and adventure and the only thoughts of returning home was when you got hungry or you were looking for a few pence to go to the shop. My older sister was a thoroughly social child and she spent every waking hour on the streets with her gang of friends. I was a more introspective kid, and while I had my circle of friends, I was going through one of my I need to be on my own phases. They could last a couple of days, less often, entire weeks. I think I may have been in week two of one of those phases. My mother had headed out to the shop for a littl...