Just over five years ago, I posted the first post on this blog, beginning what I thought would be a process of recording the researching and writing of a book about the men of the Royal Army Medical Corps in the First World War. Just under two weeks ago, I submitted the completed manuscript to the publisher, on the final day the university was open this calendar year. It was a climax, a culmination. But it wasn’t an ending.

There are several reasons why I say this with some confidence, about both the book and this blog. As far at the book is concerned, there is still a great deal left to do – permissions to be sought, images to be sourced, indexes to be completed – and the manuscript itself is to be sent to yet another reader. And this blog has, in the past five years, wandered into all sorts of byways unrelated to the project it was set up to chronicle.  In spite of my neglect of it over the past few months as I’ve concentrated on finishing the manuscript, it remains an important outlet for me, and I will continue to use it to chronicle the ups and downs of academic life, my new research project, my eternal struggle to create an acceptable work/life and, inevitable, a range of thoughts and responses the commemoration and memory of the First World War in British culture.

Yet, while this has been a moment of transition rather than ending, there have been points of ending and new beginnings along the way. The direct funding for this project ended two years ago. In its place, I’ve started on new (related) research , as well as gaining two new job titles. Intellectually and personally life has interwoven, overlapped, bled into itself.

Which, particularly at this time of year, doesn’t stop me looking for tidy endings and new beginnings. Even as I am aware of the chaos of books all over the floor that awaits my return to the office, along with all the projects I’ve been putting off for the past three months, I am also hoping that having given myself permission not to work for two weeks over the holiday period will give me the energy to start if not anew in January, then at least afresh.  There is the blog post I’ve been meaning to write since the summer which, with space from other deadlines, I hope to finally complete; there is the pile of books I’ve been collecting, looking for the time and space to engage with them properly.

There will, I hope, be more, and more definite endings in the coming year, with the final completion of the book. There will also, I anticipate, be beginnings – of ideas, projects, collaborations – as well as the new beginning marked by moving to a new home in the spring. All have looking forward to the near future in ways that hasn’t been true for the past couple of years.

So, at this turning of the year, I wish you all successful endings and hopeful beginnings for the new year.

Happy new year, one and all.