"Well, I'd better stop biting my tongue and start biting the bullet. There's only one way to do this and that's to tell it in order, chronological order. I know writing it down is important to us. It's terribly, terribly important Recording what we've done, in words, on paper, it's got to be our way of telling ourselves that we mean something, that we matter. That the things we've done have made a difference. I don't know how big a difference, but a difference. Writing it down means we might be remembered. And by God that matters to us.
"None of us wants to end up as a pile of dead white bones, unnoticed, unknown, and worst of all, with no one knowing or appreciating the risks we've run.
"That makes me think that I should be writing this like a history book, in very serious language, all formal. But I can't do that. Everyone's got their own way and this is mine. If they don't like my way they'll have to find someone else.
"OK, better do it then.
"It all began when ... They're funny, those words. Everyone uses them, without thinking what they mean. When does anything begin? With everyone, it begins when you're born. Or before that, when your parents got married. Or before that, when your parents were born Or when your ancestors colonised the place. Or when humans came squishing out of the mud and slime, dropped off their flippers and fins, and started to walk. But all the same, all that aside, for what's happened to us there was quite a definite beginning.
"So: it all began when..."
Excerpt from Tomorrow, When the War Began
