This opening paragraph will need further editing to make it more succinct and give it more flow and meaning but, for now, (just to get the bullet points onto this page), the following will do.
I’ve had an amazing life … with experiences ranging from the sublime to the bizarre, surviving a surreal occult based abusive childhood upbringing, a violent Clockwork Orange style teenage phase guiding a band of fellow Yeovil skinheads, an ‘alternate’ Bridport based hippy style social life in my mid 20’s and, later, enjoying the manifestations and heights of a fabulous 20 year love story of a marriage as a younger man.
I went on to have a fabulous career in construction as a Finishing Foreman and Site Agent, enjoyed a super career in Local Government as a Works Inspector supervising trades and contractors across 420 sq miles of West Dorset and later invented and patented an “entirely new engineering principle”, winning international acclaim as an inventor and designer before, (as a direct result of that ‘so called’ success), losing my family and all I ever held dear, (pause), plunging me into the depths and despair of contemplating taking my own life by my early 40’s.
Eventually, living a further couple of decades online, including 20 years as the online character of Beach, (who, as my alter ego saved my life), I reinvent myself entirely to, eventually, reach my 60’s to fully appreciate and understand all sides of the human condition.
Yes. I understand that everybody who knows me in my real life will know little of Beach but, at a time in my life when I thought I’d lost everything, I used such an alter ego to discuss things online, (with strangers on a quirky little online friendship site), that were just too traumatic and disturbing to ever discuss with friends or relatives in the real world!
Without such a channel to reveal and release my inner demons to the world, I would never have got through the maelstom of issues I was facing at the time.
Thus, back in 1999, when I had lost everything, Beach and my alternate family of friends online saved my life!
And yes, even though I was International Inventor of the Year, (Twice), few people in my real world even knew the real detail and drama of that amazing adventure yet, for 20 years, I have shared the whole story of The Gravity Venture, intimately, with strangers who, over the course of that 20 years, became really close confidants, online friends and people who only ever knew me as Beach … rather than Chris!
Hence, in sharing my life story today, I choose to do so, largely, using the medium of Beach using this site, Beachthorncombe.co.uk
But why Beach Thorncombe? (Why the Thorncombe “surname”?)
Well. You’ll have to read on to find out! (Or, perhaps, you can just guess)