Sunday magazine runs a feature called Way Back When, where TV presenters, entertainers and the variously famous talk their way through a childhood photo.
I have been waiting nearly two years to be summoned for this feature.
I have been waiting in vain.
No matter, I will do it here.
While I was tidying the hall cupboard, I came across a box of musty memorabilia which included a Way-Back-When photo that was simply riveting, a 1960 Otago cricket programme for the game between Otago and Northern Districts.
And I am on the cover.
It should be immediately added that in 1960, thousands of people attended Plunket Shield cricket games like this, and to be featured in full monochromatic glory on the cover was like being on the front page of this newspaper three times.
Plus, people kept these old cricket programmes.
I know I did.
The game will have been at The Oval, where I played every Saturday morning for the Kaikorai club.
My coach, Mr Barron, played league cricket for Tainui Rovers at The Oval on Saturday afternoons, and as they were always one short, I played for them as well.
League cricketers played what is now called twenty/20, and in between innings, they went to the pub.
If you won the toss in league cricket, you batted first.
It wasn't really the place for a 10-year-old.
But I would have played cricket 24 hours a day Way Back When.
Cricketing purists will peer closely at this picture and ask themselves a number of questions.
I am the batsman.
I am not sure where the ball is, though it is apparent I have missed it.
Why the wicketkeeper is standing at Silly Mid Off is a mystery.
I suspect the ball may have come to rest and I have been swinging fruitlessly at it for some time, so he finally decided to pop around and pick the damn thing up.
Those who remember my batting will know I tended to wander towards Square Leg if there was any pace on the ball, and I do remember playing shots like this, with the bat pointing at the wicketkeeper's left rib cage.
But there are no stumps in this picture, so this is me on the Victor Trumper charge, not my patented fear-fuelled square paddle, a shot later played much better, without fear, by Glenn Turner.
Is that scorn on Snook's face?The wicketkeeper is, I think, Ian Snook, who later played rugby for Taranaki.
But dementia could be winning on this one.
The boy wearing AFL shorts at what purists would call Alongside Silly Mid Off has a faintly patronising grin, but that could just be a wrinkle in the programme.
Over in the gully is a boy clearly aware of what damage the fear-fuelled square paddle could do if I ever connected as his hands are poised directly above his todger.
We did not wear protective equipment in 1960.
Kids just wore one pad Way Back When.
I remember Grant Kerr, later a lawyer in New Plymouth living directly opposite Pukekeura Park, coming out to bat against us in a school game with his pad on the wrong leg.
Kerr was a solid batsman, 30 runs per innings better than me, but our derisive sledging, before derisive sledging had even been invented, had him off our hands after three balls.
Devotees of the Dunedin Sound will be pleased to see me wearing a black jersey, but monochrome is a great deceiver, the jersey was dark green.
And if you look at the ad, you will note the Otago Sports Depot had three branches, and carried the widest collection of cricketing equipment in the South Island.
If you bought your bat from them, they would oil and hand hammer it for free.
I can smell the linseed oil now.
I should perhaps have put more on that day Way Back When.
Roy Colbert is a Dunedin writer.
