A FORK IN THE ROAD

When I look back at the stage of my life when I was a young man, I can't help thinking 'What if?' I do this only as random musing, not with any sense of regret. I am very happy with the way my life turned out. Some things were the result of choices which I made and some came about by chance.

There was however, one particular decision which I always regard with amusement. I was about 20 and was working for a company called Harveys who still exist today. They are vintners producing a range of fine wines, port and sherry their trademark product being 'Harveys Bristol Cream'.

I started working in the postal department where I was single-handedly responsible for the despatch of all orders which were to be sent by post rather than by the more usual freight deliveries. It seems that I did a good job for after about 6 months, my manager called me into his office and told me that he was so impressed with me that he was going to arrange for me to be moved into whichever department I wished. I was shown each of the many different departments and their contribution to the business was explained to me.

Eventually, I had a clear vision of how Harveys worked and narrowed my choice down to two areas - 'Wine-buying' and 'Cost Accounting'. The former would involve a great deal of travel to the many vineyards which the company dealt with and the work centred around negotiating future purchases. The latter would involve no travel whatsoever. The nature of the job was to keep track of the cost of wine bought from the vineyard then to add in shipping costs, custom costs, bottling costs and so on. Having informed the company exactly how much a particular wine had cost them, someone else then added on the amount of profit required and so the selling price was arrived at.

As you may have guessed, I chose Cost Accounting. I think the reason I did so was because I had completely lost my mind of my fear of flying. Even so, it is hard not to see this as a missed opportunity of some sort. If my description of cost accounting above makes the job sound in any way interesting don't be fooled. I was bored witless by it and soon left the company.

So while I sometimes muse about what might have been if I had travelled the world as a wine-buyer, I also feel that it was somehow a lucky escape which enabled me to later discover my true purpose in life, teaching children with special needs.