Passing the Baton

Two things happened this week that made me realise that I’m getting older and perhaps moving towards the end of my time as a fully productive member of the community. 

I’ve been mentoring young adult care leavers for a few years now.  But this week two of my mentees were approached by Social Services to act as mentors themselves to an 18 year old who has just timed out of foster care. It is right and proper that E+E should be given this opportunity and I’m sure they will do the job with youthful energy and with the compassion born of their own experiences. Nevertheless it brought home to me that people I have supported – and even trained to a certain extent – are now in a position to take on posts of significant responsibility without any further help from me.

E+E have changed enormously during the time I have known them and I feel quite proud that I played some small part in this. But I would be lying if I denied that it has come a rather a shock to realise that perhaps I haven’t got much more to teach them.

It was much the same at a local school. One of the younger governors has done a superb job on a wide-ranging project of real importance. I realised that although at one time I could have done an equally good job that time has now passed. I’m not convinced that I still have the dynamism required to do jobs that I would have done without a second thought only a few years ago.