A tearful goodbye to a lifetime of front pages

I’M SAT in my now deserted office surrounded by the debris of three and a half years editing and some of the hundreds of front pages we have put together in that time.

Much to the chagrin of the ‘property and facilities’ people I stuck them on the wall with Blu-Tack and Sellotape (other brands are available!) and used them daily as a learning tool, something to impress visitors and a good place to go when you run out of ideas.

I’m also reminded of Rachel, who came to us on work experience for six months via Mencap and plastered a lot of them together at just the height she could reach – which wasn’t very high.

I’ve had too many jobs in too many places to get over-sentimental about leaving a building but these pages make the place feel more like a living being than just bricks and mortar. Some were award winners, others were turkeys. Some fell into our laps and other we had to work hard for. But all of them reflect the very best efforts of everybody at the time.

Now we’re off to the other side of town to a spiffy office with nice desks, posh computer stands and a ‘printing station’. I wonder if there will be room for a new ‘living wall’…