Here we go.

"Around the time the climate was warming up after the last ice age, I left school. The name of the school doesn't matter, it wasn't exactly a pillar of the educational establishment and I doubt if anyone will erect a plaque to mark the years I spent there.

Being born of several generations of Northern England stock and brought up in the North Midlands, I was destined to follow in the family tradition. This required me to be "one up" on the other folk in our street by becoming a "skilled" worker. After all, we were a cut above the rest - we occasionally used knives and forks, jewellery to most of my peer group.

In order that I might uphold the family tradition and aspire to the dizzy heights such a privileged individual might expect I was " put to the tools". That is to say I was indentured to a local building company as an apprentice bricklayer. I looked forward to the prospect of a glowing career erecting monuments to society and human achievement, not to mention the odd architectural masterpiece that would stand for centuries.

What actually happened fell rather short of my expectations.

I found myself down holes in the ground building drains, manhole shafts to be precise and not what I envisaged all. A worse fate awaited me on the next site: down an even bigger hole in the steel works, building furnace foundations.

What was going wrong?

Why was this happening to me? I was a very superior being. I came from a background of skilled workers. I knew how to use a knife and fork.

The breakthrough came when I made an astounding discovery. I discovered that workers who wore white shirts to work were civilly addressed by their first name by the population at large and their immediate boss in particular. People who wore overalls were in the main addressed as "oy you" or even worse, by their second name. When I raised my head above the edge of the hole down which I spent eight hours a day I made a further discovery.

The female of the species.

I put the two discoveries together. Young women in tight skirts who walked with a wiggle went into places called offices each day. Young men who wore white shirts, who were addressed by their first names, went into the same offices. What did people who went in and out of offices do?

What was I to do? I knew instinctively that I was having ideas above my station, revolutionary ideas that would at the very least isolate me from the folk in our street. Ideas that would certainly cause a rift within my family and most likely lead to me being held to ridicule by all who knew me.

Wear a white shirt for work? Work in an office? The only white shirt we ever saw in our street was on the back of the rent man or the local bookie.

The decision took me all of thirty seconds to make.

I left the building trade and its holes in the ground forever. I set out on the road to further discoveries. Discoveries such as what was on the other side of an office door and what the people beyond that door actually did.

I worked in several offices, I made and spent a lot of money. I performed a variety tasks and enjoyed every minute.

Every day was a day of discovery. After a few moves I settled down to a job in a brewery transport office where I stayed for a few years."

Jo B Hunter