At the time when I lived in England, the country was greatly populated by a fearsome clan known as business men. For those interested in ancestory, I must stipulate that the word 'clan' is used in a reserved, even a metaphoric sense, and for those interested in etymology I must embelish that the phrase business men would have the obviated derivation.
I was not a member of this clan. A fact for which, I confess, I am rather proud. On the outside of their romantic clique, morality existed in shiny golden and rich red embelishments on the carpets of the souls (and often growing over the skirt and up the walls with it's royal gaze set firmly on the freize). However, even the most sturdy member of clergy or dreamer alike, once coming too close to the precipiece of 'the business world' was in danger of being whipped up in the arms of a trade wind and swept into the swirling world of fashion, barter and timeshares.
The business world, I am frequently tipped, is the subject of the unwritten fifth volume of Dante's Divine Comedy, it's infruition being no doubt down to the authors cowardise. As an observer I know the business world. If you have the right wings, you may fly close enough to the black hearts to see through the lies and snobbery as an incautious driver may peer through the frosted up windowscreen of his happy little crash car.
I have brushed up against the crisp papers of the business men, brochures and loose leaf both. I have taken the paper cuts and had both hands stapled but never will I slaken the stays that shackle me to the real world.
The business man is a peculiar beast. One could imagine it is bred to give the optimum meat, ready seasoned with old spice and paco rabane. It comes atopped with an immaculate hairpiece, or worse still a small well-oiled pony tail. It would be wrong to say that all vanity rendered the subject an hilarious fake, but as all rules have their exceptions, so must they have copious compliances.
I was most assuredly a secret enemy of the business man. I am declined to say that I was afeared of being a blatant enemy to the aforementioned, when the term 'not so foolhardy' ha such a marvellous meter. Any enemy of business would be crushed unashamedly into a thousand equal pieces and no doubt be bottled, bagged or boxed and sold at a sickening profit.
The business men were not simply ingenious but occassionally they were charmingly whimsical. I recall the government of the time were taken to allowing physically disabled people the priveledge of parking their automobiles at their convenience. As was the vogue of that central body, this priveledge was not issued on trust but with an orange permit badge.
The scheme was introduced as a charitable gesture not as an incentive for personal modification. Despite this a portion of the shrewdest business men took the investment of sawing off their least used arms in trade for a smart orange badge.
I wonder if perhaps I share blood with a high ranking parliamentarian, for just as the trend of self de-limbitation was peaking, so too the government phased out the motor car and re-introduced the tramcars. God may not be very shrewd, but it has to be said that he does have a sense of humour.
THE END.