line was engraved on your chin by what can only be called an invisible hand, that your body is the site of events that have been expunged from history.

It is June 1959. You are twelve years old, and in one week you and your sixth-grade classmates will be graduating from the grammar school you have attended since you were five. It is a splendid day, late spring in its most lustrous incarnation, sunlight pouring down from a cloudless blue sky, warm but not too warm, scant humidity, a soft breeze stirring the air and rippling over your face and neck and bare arms. Once school lets out for the day, you and a gang of your friends repair to Grove Park for a game of pickup baseball. Groverep walked out after one hour of talks to announce strikes on Monday, signaling their frustration.

Embedded in national culture

Reverence for the NHS is rooted in the creation story of the behemoth organization — the fifth largest employer in the world — and the extent to which it transformed British culture and identity.

On July 5, 1948, the health service became “national” under the Labour party, when Health Secretary Aneurin Bevan opened Park Hospital in Manchester. Ill health, its backers claimed, was no longer something poor people feared.

Various governments, both left and right, have tried to tinker with the NHS — usually with mixed success.

The final day of three proposed strike periods, starting next week, would be a complete walkout by nearly 37,000 junior doctors, of around 50,000 total in