I Was There!

As a general rule I avoid reunions, you know the sort of thing I mean. The class of whatever meet years afterwards and exchanges news, reminiscences and anecdotes, most of which don’t coincide with your own memory of events. Erstwhile classmates you haven’t seen for ages remind you of embarrassing moments you hoped everyone had forgotten. The class bully swaggers around making you wonder why he wasn’t locked up years ago, and the one universally regarded as the ‘One Most Likely To Succeed’ tries hard to convince all and sundry that he has delivered in spades the potential that had been so obvious when young, then ends every conversation with you by asking… “What was it you said you did?”
 
No, none of that’s for me. I even find it difficult to turn around and go back to find the right road when I have taken a wrong one, preferring instead to drive on a bit further and find another route to where I am headed. There’s probably a deep psychological reason for that I don’t want to know about, but I suppose basically what I am saying is that I never go back.
 
I will admit that I have sneaked a look at the Friends Reunited site…just to see if any of those I knew were there…but they weren’t! And I did go to a sort of reunion last week, though not an old school reunion, my old school no longer exists, the building has been turned into a block of flats and the name has gone forever. This was a meeting of the pensioners’ association of a company I once worked for. I serve on it’s committee and this was the annual general meeting. About one hundred and twenty members attended. Representatives from the company were there and trustees of the company pension schemes too. It was a good meeting in a friendly atmosphere.
 
Sitting at the back of hall with some of those I worked with so long ago, I couldn’t help thinking about the changes that had taken place since I first became a member of that pension scheme. Most of those in the hall had been employed in the production and administration departments of the newspapers the company published. In their day, and mine, the flagship newspaper sold over five million copies a day. Industry research showed that it had three readers per copy, that meant fifteen million people saw the paper every day, one in three of all adults! The company owned the building in Holborn Circus and was a powerful financial and political voice that commanded respect from the establishment. I reflected sadly that the current circulation is under half that figure and the company has changed hands two or three times. How times have changed!
 
Though the company then was highly successful in most of it’s activities, an area it would never claim as a success would be the area of industrial relations. They were not alone in that respect, as I looked around I realised that many of those in that room would have been involved with the strikes and unrest that beset the entire newspaper industry at the time. Maybe some of them were amongst those who demanded and were awarded a payment for not being involved with the launch of the ill-fated colour magazine. Later, they must all have been affected by the move from hot metal to computer and electronic production, the changes in ownership and the collapse of the market for all newspapers. Most wouldn’t have been invited to move to Canary Wharf.
 
So many stories in that room, not just from the journalists present but from every single person there. They were all working when their pension fund was hi-jacked, they must have wondered if all the funds they had so carefully and willingly contributed to it would ever be recovered. The chances are they never would have been reclaimed had it not been for the courage and tenacity of a few men and women who refused to accept that nothing could be done and, risking everything they had, challenged the law, the banking system, and anyone else remotely involved in the misuse of the schemes’ funds, to make restoration. And they won!!!
 
So today nostalgia ruled OK! Past differences were put aside, the best of the times they had shared were recalled, re-lived and no doubt embellished. Colleagues they had hoped to see and hadn’t, for one reason or another, were remembered with affection and in some cases without. Events that had taken place late at night, deep in the machine rooms or elsewhere were discussed for the umpteenth time and still provided amusement for those who had been involved and astonishment for those who had not. The time the Imperial FOC said to the Chairman…… it was all re-lived and enjoyed again. An unconnected listener could be forgiven for thinking it all happened last week, rather than twenty or thirty years ago .
 
I didn’t know most of the people there since most worked at night and I during the day, but without knowing it they had all been an important part of my business life. Like everyone else I too chatted over old times with those I did know and enjoyed doing so. Well they were good times…..I know… I was there!