THINGS NOT TO DO IN RETIREMENT.
At the end of March 1989, faced with yet another unnecessary change in the structure of the National Health Service, I retired. I was fifty eight and had been in the business for thirty two years. I was glad to see the back of it.
Since 1974 there had been several pointless major changes, clearly politically motivated and obviously designed to give bigger empires to ambitious little creeps in the civil service. None of the changes had ever benefited the patient.
The NHS was a mess and still is.
As soon as politicians sense the political gain to be made from mindlessly meddling with a public service you can be sure they will turn it into an administrative nightmare. Currently the NHS is controlled by bunches of faceless, unelected yes-persons called Trusts. I wouldn't trust any of them to control off-peak traffic in a remote village.
Anyway, there was I, retired and still young enough to do something other than go out and sit on a park bench or stay in and watch television.
"Lots of retired blokes play golf," I said to my Leader. "Perhaps I should learn to play golf."
She dismissed the notion instantly.
"I don't think so. You would very soon find that you were not going to become another Faldo or Ballesteros. You'd be in a permanently bad temper and your blood pressure would suffer."
I knew she was right. Always erratic at games, I've never been much of an outdoor type.
I needed an indoor hobby.
"How about the piano then? I had a couple of lessons when I was little. I can still play Drink To Me Only with both hands."
"But you'd never get to play Rachmaninov 2 like John Ogden or the Grieg like Philip Fowke. Think how frustrating that would be for you."
I sighed: I knew she was right.
"Why not try art classes or something?" she prompted. "Or maybe get a little part-time job."
So I obtained - worked at for three years, then took my second and final retirement from - a little part time job.
The job was with Age Concern, a registered charity.
CHARITY IS A SHREWD BUSINESS.
One of the first things you have to understand as an employee new to a national charity is that you are not working for a benign benefactor you are working for a shrewd business.
Charities have honed their collecting techniques over the years and there are now few lucrative avenues left for them to explore. They have become landlords, shopkeepers and insurance brokers. Their manipulation of self-serving politicians is experienced and clever. The vast office blocks from which most of them operate and the plethora of high street charity shops and local administrative offices under their control are not subject to normal business council tax.
They appeal to the well-meaning and are an irresistable draw to publicity conscious celebrities.
I was the district organizer (known here as The Secretary) of Age Concern, Isle of Wight. I worked weekday mornings, was on a small honorarium which barely covered my travel to and from the office, parking and the telephone calls which I frequently made from home in the afternoon. But I was happy enough.
As time went by I came to meet district organizers from across the water; a bloke from Hampshire who I soon learned not to take at face value - either of them - and a nice chap in Portsmouth who had once been a Catholic Monsignor or something and had abandoned his calling to get married. I liked him. I found that they (and hundreds more like them within the organization) were full-timers on very decent salaries. Nothing wrong with that. They were, after all, working for a sacred cow.
I think it was Robert Townsend in his book Up The Organization who maintained that three years was enough time for a manager who gives fully to his job: the rascal should then go gracefully or be carried out kicking and screaming.
I decided it was time to depart.
I wrote a letter to my Chairperson recommending the direction in which Age Concern, Isle of Wight, should head: it included the appointment of a full-time Organizer (which, I stipulated, would not be me) a move from the coastal town of Ryde to the capital town of Newport and the setting up of an Island A.C. shop which at that time it did not have.
I had done all I could. I departed gracefully.
My only connection with Age Concern from then on was through the car insurance which I took out with them in the early nineties and, because I paid monthly by direct debit, was too apathetic to change.
Recently I became disenchanted with their insurance branch. It had developed cunning plans for levying additional revenue. These included turning over the customer's direct debit to a credit company (which, of course, charged interest) and exacting a payment (usually £10) whenever any change was made to the customer's computer details.
Don't get me wrong, I didn't completely dismiss Age Concern. I just started to take their concern for the aged cum grano salis.
So this year I found a far better car insurance deal on the internet.
It pleases me to report that all my recommendations for A.C. Isle of Wight were later implemented.
I wonder who took the credit for them?
BRIEF CHAT WITH A SLEEPY CAT.
"Bit dire without the golf," the cat Shadow ventured, snug and half asleep in my Leader's chair.
"Good, wasn't it, Padraig Harrington winning the Open?" I said. "Nice to have an Irishman as champion again."
"Were you alive when the last one won it?"
"1947, Fred Daly. He was the only other Irishman. Yeah, I was alive."
"Did you follow it?"
"No, all I can remember about golf then was Norman Von Nida throwing his clubs over hedges."
"South African was he?"
"Australian: I think they named a tournament after him."
"Funny how they always honour the bad tempered buggers," he said. "I'm surprised they've not renamed Wimbledon McEnroe Fortnight and had the finalists competing for the You Cannot Be Serious Cup."
I pointed out that ol' Mac has mellowed a lot over the years and that Norman, who died in May this year aged 93, was probably a lovely bloke away from the golf course...
Then I heard a faint snore mixed with the purr and it was clear that he had dropped off again.
His conversations can be quite brief.
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