50-year old Virgin

Wednesday 2 July 1997 is a date I will never forget.

It was the day I met Richard Branson and John Major, and appeared on the BBC Six and Ten O'Clock News.  (Oh, and I also met my future wife but that's not relevant to this story).

Yes, Richard Branson.  He was hosting a Virgin Atlantic reception in Westminster that night and one of the MPs I worked for took me along as his plus one.

My experience of meeting my first billionaire was initially underwhelming.  First, he had broken his right hand which was in a cast and was reduced to giving guests a rather limp left hand to waggle.  Second, as he waggled my hand, he was actually talking to someone else and didn't look at me.  

Unperturbed, I was determined to have a word which I did after a couple of glasses of posh fizz.  

I wanted to tell him about the time he flew over our house in Coleraine in his big balloon in July 1987, after initially touching down in Limavady before landing with a splash in the sea off the coast of Portrush.  

My dad was in our back garden and saw Branson's stricken "Virgin Atlantic Flyer" drift overhead.  

Sadly, I was on the toilet at the critical moment and missed the whole thing, but chose not to share this anticlimactic fact with my host.  (To be fair, I'm not convinced this would have heightened his enthusiasm for my monologue which did not appear to be hitting its target).

We all had to put our business cards in a big bowl as we left (I had a homemade card I designed in the Post Office) and, about a week later, all attendees received a signed letter from the great man to say thank you for coming and what a wonderful company Virgin Atlantic was.

As the least important guest at the event (on the grounds that I hadn't been invited), I took it upon myself to respond to say thank you back.

To my surprise, I received a second letter from Branson about a month later, this time a handwritten job on notepaper headed with his home address. 

I make no apology for saying that I have written to him at least a dozen more times over the past 25 years although never received another reply - until yesterday.

Because last night, when I was celebrating my 50th birthday at home with Vanessa and the kids, a knock came to our front door.  It was a courier with a letter for me.

It was from a gentleman by the name of George Whitesides, Chair of Virgin Galactic's Space Advisory Board.  

Unfortunately Charlotte has taken the letter to school to show her classmates so I'll have to paraphrase.  But in short, he said that Richard Branson had told him of my many years of writing to him and he was aware that yesterday was my "special day" (i.e. I had turned 50).

And to celebrate this "momentous occasion" (I remember some of the phraseology) he was inviting me to "take a trip to the stars" on board one of his Virgin Galactic planes.  Goodness knows how much these flights cost but I suppose that's not my problem.   

It takes off and lands in New Mexico where I've got to go for two days' training with the flight on day three.  They will cover the costs of getting me there, plus accommodation - further details to follow. Sadly the flight won't be until 2025 - when I'll actually be 53 - but I'm not going to quibble.

Because for the next three years I can go to bed every night every night in the knowledge that I am to become Coleraine's first spaceman.  (Eat your heart out, Jimmy Nesbitt).