My Radiotherapy Career....in the beginning, a blast from the past

Since I just retired a few days ago after 28 years at the TBCC in Calgary, working as a Radiation Therapist (mostly as a Dosimetrist), I was thinking back to the early days when I started a a Student "Therapeutic Radiographer" in Belfast in 1978. The funny thing is I have zero photos from those days, except for this very murky one below taken in 1980, probably just before I graduated (we called it "qualifying").

I suppose people didn't take many photos back then. Cellphones weren't invented, there was no internet, so there was no "sharing" as we know it today! I remember having this simple little film camera that never took very good photos - that's what must have been used for this picture. I would send the film off in the post to "Truprint" to have it developed. That must have been cheaper than taking it to the local Chemist shop (drug store to North Americans) for developing, which was the other option.
Here I am in the middle with my only two classmates,
 Blaithin and Jennifer. Note the starchy white dresses





Right: Here's me (with the mask) with my two fellow students and long-time friends (one year behind), also from Sligo as it happens. I have now qualified (I can tell by the badge on my lapel) and we have made our way into the operating theatre after hours to have a laugh  doing this fake procedure! I should have had more sense - I'm sure we could have gotten into serious trouble if we were caught.

 Below: I'm in the middle with the pants uniform. This was in 1983 shortly after graduating from Diagnostic Radiography. We have all gotten jobs and are wearing the respective uniforms from our hospitals. The rest of these friends had stayed in Northern Ireland, but I have by now taken a job in London back in the field of Radiotherapy, and have returned for the official graduation ceremony.

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