About me, why a watchmaker and what's with the enso?

My name is Peter Ronan and I am currently studying Horology at Birmingham City University. But here's a bit about how I got here.

After leaving school I spent 5 years as an apprentice toolmaker while attending Sandwell college and then spent the next decade working my way up to toolroom supervisor. I then set up a small property maintenance business, mainly doing insurance work. I missed engineering but I enjoyed working for myself and the physicality of plastering so many ceilings.

The first image was from a holiday to Hong Kong my wife and I went on in 2014. Those shoulders were from my love of gym and plastering ceilings.

In 2019 my wife and I spent 3 weeks touring New Zealand and while there I felt quite poorly but I just pushed through, climbing mountains and driving hundreds of Kilometres a day. Turns out I had aggressive stage 4 bowel cancer. (centre image)

After my surgery and I was physically and mentally in a terrible place. The journey to health and wellness seemed impossible and at times nearly got the better of me. I began to read as it was about all I could manage. I read about consciousness, the brain, health, wellness and spirituality. I was generally looking for an answer as to why this happened to me and to how I could find a new direction in life. Around this time I had 3 tattoos that represented life and death. One being an enso. I love this symbol and the meaning behind it. Mainly that life isnt perfect and all journeys can start again. 

" When you believe that you have arrived at some final destination on your path, ensō reminds you to start again exactly at the point where you are now and to embrace and enjoy your unique experiences on life’s journey. "*

The image furthest to the right is me in 2024 at Birmingham City University horology department. It was a long recovery to get to this point but I dont give up easy. 

The negatives are that I cant lift anything heavy anymore, my fitness has all but gone and I have been out of engineering a long time so I felt both my previous careers were a no no.. Suddenly losing your health, wealth and direction is very very tough to deal with. Feeling lost is an understatement.

While health wise I was getting stronger, I still needed a direction for life. And part of the turnaround happened when I met a guy called Lance Bennet, a watchmaker who happened to work near me. He repaired a watch of mine and we got talking. I had been buying cheap watches, cleaning them up and selling them just really to keep my mind active during years of recovery. We would talk about watches for ages each time we met and It was him who pointed me in the direction of BCU horology. A degree he himself had completed.

I needed a new career and I had my engineering, my love of watches, I needed a job where I could sit down, so it seemed perfect. Plus I had the time to retrain. 

My consultants weren't keen on the idea of doing a full time university degree as it would be too hard on me physically.

But, climbing a snow capped mountain on the other side of the world with aggressive stage 4 cancer was much harder that sitting in a university workshop.

*https://modernzen.org/enso-htm/