There are places we all frequent regularly, where the social contract is so fragile that one wrong move can shatter it entirely. A quiet train carriage. A lift with only two people in it. A Post Office queue.

But nowhere is the contract more delicate, or more terrifyingly easy to violate, than men’s changing rooms at a gym or swimming pool.

I saw a quote online a few years back, and it went something like this: at some point, you picked up your child for the last time and didn’t know it was the last time.

Amongst all the guff I see on the internet, that particular thought genuinely caused me to pause. Not because it’s sentimental, but because it’s true. One day, you scooped up your child without a second thought — they were crying, or tired, or just wanted a cuddle — and then you put them down, and that was it. You never did it again. None of us marked the occasion, and no one tapped us on the shoulder and said, that was the last one, mate. Hope you savoured it.

For more information on Keith A Pearson, visit his website, www.keithapearson.co.uk

We talk about tax as if it’s money. It isn’t. It’s time.

Every extra pound you earn costs a portion of your life. Getting up earlier. Sitting in traffic. Staring at screens. Missing things you’d rather be doing with the people in your life who matter. That’s the trade: your time for money.

For more information about Keith A Pearson, visit his website - www.keithapearson.co.uk