Thursday 19 July 2018

My Life Might Have Been So Different!

Back in the early 1970s when I was a student, I came home for the long summer vac and found a temporary job with a 'secretarial services' firm.  During that time, they sent me out to work for a local construction company. No not on the building site- but in their tiny Dereham Office where there were two avuncular chaps in their forties, and the boss's eldest son [a year or two older than me]  I was covering for the receptionist/typist who had gone for a three week holiday "somewhere abroad"
I answered the phone, greeted visitors, typed letters, did basic book-keeping - and mid-morning and mid-afternoon, made the refreshments [there were strict rules about which biscuits should be served to whom]
The company was RGCarter - they'd just had their 50th anniversary, having been founded in 1921 by Robert George Carter. When I went there, his son Robert was running the business, and his son "Young Mr Robert" and been sent to our little outpost to 'learn the rope"s [we were by to the fish and chip shop in Norwich Street] He was a very pleasant young man, and always extremely appreciative of my typing and teamaking skills. "Play your cards right, and you might end up being the next Mrs Carter" said one of the chaps. I seriously doubted it ...he was the boss and I was the temp. There was no question of anything else, and I couldn't play cards anyway [and still can't] I have to say that unlike some other temp jobs I had in those years, all the men in the office were perfect gentlemen. No #MeToo problems there, for which I am very grateful.
Fast forward 45 years or so, and now Young Mr Robert has grown up and is the managing director himself, and on East Anglias "Top Twenty Rich List". The company now operates from a new 'hub' in central Norfolk and is building stuff all over the place - but committed to keeping the HQ in Norfolk.
And why do I mention this now? well, there's a new "Young Mr Robert" - and he and his wife Hannah have been in the news recently. They're great friends with those another couple also Norfolk landowners, called William and Kate. Hannah was a close friend of the Duchess at school, and was chosen to be one of the Godparents for baby Price Louis at his recent Christening.
YMR's sister, Sophie Carter is also a great friend of Kate, another good friend from school days - they regularly go to Wimbledon together. She is a Godparent to Princess Charlotte.
Two questions;
1. Would my life have been as happy if I had flirted with him, and somehow ended up as wife of a millionaire Norfolk landowner [one of the 'Turnip Toffs' as the Daily Mail calls them] ??  NO, I WOULDN'T CHANGE ANY OF IT !!
2. If Hannah's new baby is a boy, will he be the next Young Mr Robert?  YES, I SUSPECT HE WILL!!








2 comments:

  1. I agree with your 1. - imagine all that dressing up in posh clothes and sitting around at "Functions"!

    ReplyDelete
  2. How funny! You do wonder about the decisions we make. I remember my friend Helen telling me she wanted to introduce me to her friend who was the inventor of the Sibelius Music Notation Software as she said that she thought we would like each other. We never did but I always wondered about whether we WOULD have actually liked each other or not! x

    ReplyDelete

Always glad to hear from you - thanks for stopping by!
I am blocking anonymous comments now, due to excessive spam!