As I write this (yesterday, if you’re reading on Friday) it’s my daughter’s ninth birthday. Ninth. As in, nine years since she was born. I am almost incredulous at this.

The rest of the world, though, seems more than happy to accept that I’m a crocked old man. A few days ago, I got a handwritten envelope in the post containing an invitation to take up not one, but two, completely free health checks at an event in Bradford to find out whether I was likely to drop dead at any second from a stroke.

My social life being what it is these days, I contemplated going along until I saw the cover of the leaflet attached to it which showed a wizened, grey-haired old man smiling weakly as he had his blood pressure tested by a stout nurse.

I raged about this to my wife until she gently pointed out that the old bloke in the photograph was probably the same age as me.

I was looking at some old photos of when our children were born. I looked younger than my actual age then. Now I think I look much older. Somewhere along the way, time seems to have decided a leisurely canter isn’t good enough and has broken out into a full-blooded gallop, taking me with it.

Nine years. I can, of course, remember every moment of the day my daughter was born, and not only because such an event, of course, is a joyous miracle of nature, but because I thought I’d be walking out of that hospital a widowed dad of two.

It wasn’t what you might call an easy birth. Our as-yet unborn daughter wasn’t lying properly, and she was long. So long and tall that it looked like there were going to be problems.

So we waited for Mother Nature to take her course, but she was obviously out doing a bit of early Christmas shopping and having a couple of cheeky Lambrinis with the girls because we waited a gazillion hours until someone finally decided that an emergency caesarean was the order of the day.

The less said about that, the better, because some things – watching your spouse’s stomach sliced open and a surgeon pulling out a baby like some kind of butcher’s-shop magician – are best kept between husband and wife.

But the aftermath saw a sudden fall into anaphylactic shock for my wife and I was literally left holding our brand-new baby as medical staff materialised and began pumping her full of adrenalin and shouting worrying things as I half-looked at our wide-eyed, newly-minted daughter and half-wondered what was happening to my wife was as serious as it looked.

It was. But she was okay. The NHS is a wonderful thing and we are going to celebrate our daughter’s ninth birthday as a family, together.

I’ll be the old, grey-haired bloke in the corner playing the pop music, if you want me.