The man came to change the electricity meter. To our bemusement he came from United Utilities, our local water authority, rather than our electricity supplier. I was handed a card with the reading of the old meter & was surprised, & somehow reassured, to see United Utilities is still based at Great Sankey, near Warrington. I commented, when United Utilities was the North West Water Authority, I'd worked there. I reminisced about a summer job I'd had there one university vacation - one of the best paid jobs I ever had, if somewhat tedious.
"Oh what were you doing?" he asked.
"Market research. I had to go through all the paperwork to check all the toxic waste that left places in the North West arrived at all the destinations in the same quantities they were meant to go to for safe disposal. At the time there had been a lot of controversy about corroding containers of toxic waste appearing in rivers, parks etc in the area."
"Oo," he said, "I didn't know that ever happened."
"It was in the mid-70s," I said.
"That was before I was born," he retorted.
I suddenly felt very old. I've lived with grey hairs most of my life, but now I felt ancient, even though I'm still in my mid-50s!
1 comment:
these sort of age related incidents are far too common; reminds me of the time I was working as a castle guide (20 years ago at that)when a group of schoolchildren I was taking round informed me that in HISTORY they were studying "the sixties" (1960's at that). We're not just old but may as well be fossilized!
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