Note to Self: Ian Callum

I’ll tell you this now: dispensing advice to my 18-year-old self is tricky. Not least because I was a bit rebellious at that age and would likely dismiss any advice from an old man.

I chose 18 because it was a confusing, disruptive and defining year for me. A coming of age in many ways. It was a year of disappointment that challenged everything I’d believed in right up until that moment. But first let’s take a minute to try to understand a little better that 18-year-old who lived over half a century ago, though it still seems like last week, and how he got that way.

I was a teenager through the 1960s. It was an amazing era of creativity and newness, although like so many of my contemporaries it was only later that I came fully to appreciate the revolution that was occurring. I saw The Beatles’ first TV broadcast and was inspired. So the teenage revolt kicked in with an awareness of dressing differently, growing my hair long – very long – and generally pushing back against the system. We questioned everything. The establishment, religion, politics, music (of course) and literature. Everything was up for grabs. I am certain that growing up in an era of such profound change contributed hugely to my notion of creativity.