When one of the editors of this journal asked me to contribute a piece, I was very happy -but also wondering what I’d send in. Luckily, the editor in question was also interested in “reflection” and there was an old paper not published elsewhere, which seemed to have some ideas useful to his own research agenda, partly around issues of “reflection”. Little did I know that this process of retrieving the paper, now 17 years old, would also retrieve memories of the whole process of learning to do academic writing, of becoming a professor, (including thoughts on why the paper has not until this time been published}, and of how one of the strongest relationships in my life began to be constructed.