It was among some unclaimed papers

No one seeing James Worthington outside of his own home town would have given him a second look. He was just an ordinary man. Everything about his outward appearance said so. Even he himself, one month short of his 25th birthday, would have agreed, had he been asked. Yet deep within his heart there lay the seed of an idea sown years before by a teacher whose name and face had faded from his memory. Poverty and the struggle to exist surrounded him back then, fitting into the scenery as he joined others going to school in threadbare clothing. At home his father, like so many others, desperately sought work to keep food on the table and the rent paid, with five mouths to feed and his wife dead these seven years now.

It was at school where James found his self-esteem matching the lowest level of existence. The awareness of this standing was a gradual thing and came about by observation. He noticed some teachers favoured pupils who were generally better clothed and better fed because their parents were better off. As a consequence they received more attention and performed well at school. This did not sour his attitude toward those pupils or the teachers. He continued to live as carefree a life as we possible amidst such surroundings. In any case, self-esteem was an unknown term to pupils, and apparently to teachers too in those days.

Considering the start he'd had, James succeeded remarkably well, quite in keeping with the seed sown in his mind by his teacher. As the ground is not aware of what is placed within it, so to his knowledge, no conscious thought made James aware that the seed had germinated and begun to grow. If his love of words and books, the feeding of his imagination by an ever-widening choice of reading, his thirst for information and knowledge was apparent to others, it did not register in his mind, but in the process he was becoming an educated man.

At some point James left the country of his birth and set out to settle in New Zealand where he was accepted for what he was. With his achievements recognised and rewarded he was encouraged to further study and develop his skills. Some years later, now happily married and with children, he returned to his homeland, keen to know more of his family and background. He'd given himself a month to research at the Public Records Office in his home town.

The year was 1988, the month was December, and having completed as much of his research as he was able, he boarded the plane that was to take him home to New Zealand, via the USA. That hight he disappeared in an explosion which blew apart the Pan Am flight 103 he was on high above Lockerbie in Scotland. Whatever may have been left of James and most of his fellow passengers was buried in a mass grave not far from where they came to rest. The terrorists who planted the bomb saw and cared nothing for the horror they had created.

James' son visited Lockerbie after he had completed his studies and made his way slowly through the memorial hall set up there. At one stage he came across some pages of unclaimed papers, miraculously having survived the explosion. Tears filled his eyes as he stopped to read one of them. It said,

As the twig is bent, so the tree will grow.

These words were written by his father, James Worthington, in his own handwriting, and were among the last words he wrote. His son wept.

Dennis Crompton © 1998