May the force be with you

So here lie the dilemmas: We are living longer, but the quality of life (and, specifically, health) in our latter years is getting poorer. We will spend increasing proportions of our twilight years in healthcare or social institutions (though it is debatable how much we will be aware of it when the time comes). In so doing, we will spend our children’s inheritance and contribute to bankrupting the economy, undoing most of what we have spent our lives trying to support. To counter this fact, we will have to work longer and pay more into our pensions for less in return – which means more years of misery commuting on dysfunctional rail-lines with angry co-passengers harbouring increasingly unpleasant and multi-resistant diseases. We will have to pay higher tax, which means more financial woes, more frustration with those who abuse the state and less incentive to actually get out of bed and go to work. Coupled with increasing utility bills, food costs, a Brexit economy and the mandatory expenditure on Netflix™ and Amazon Prime™, we will have less time and money to spend on the pleasures of life. At the same time, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer – the social gap widens, the population grows, the longevity of the planet diminishes and the uplifting green spaces disappear to make way for more mobile phone and charity shops. Life will be bleak, monochrome, like a film about the Great Depression that never ends – only it’s real life – your life …

Feeling depressed? Well don’t – there are solutions to the above that will fill your latter days with fun and excitement while keeping a roof over your head and food in your mouth:

Option 1: Rob a bank (think Hatton Gardens not The Comedy about a Bank Robbery).

It’s win, win. If you get away with it you will be absolutely loaded and can live the frivolous life of an aging rock star or Jeremy Hunt – you can even upgrade your Netflix subscription to ‘multi-user’. If you get caught you will get your food and accommodation provided at Her/His Majesty’s pleasure in a stimulating environment where you will meet and mingle with low achieving but exciting youngsters of a wayward tendency who will love and worship your approach to life. You will be able to set yourself up as the prison patriarch – Italian Job-style (the original, not the remake). And if you ever get released you will have made a new bunch of life-loving friends with whom you can spend your final years – living the dream – which leads to the Option 2:

Option 2: Live the dream anyway.

If we work on the premise that your life to date will have been tediously boring and expensive, then what’s not to like about retiring early and living the dream to such excess that you won’t make it to an old and decrepit state. Given that your kids won’t have any inheritance anyway, why not spend it on debauchery, motorbikes and extreme sports. If you do anything illegal and get caught then see Option 1. If you don’t get caught then see the ‘early release’ section of Option 1. You’ll die early (which will please the Chancellor – less pension benefits) and you’ll have contributed to the economy (even if it’s the underground one) through your Hedonistic life-style.

If you wish for any further guidance, please make an appointment to see me at your earliest convenience.

‘Hmmm’ says Trees. ‘It’s very different from the advice that my financial adviser gave me’.

‘I know’ replies Wood, ‘but it does seem like good advice, and it’s resilient’.

‘I’m not so sure’ says Trees, looking a little concerned. ‘If you ever publicised this, I am pretty sure it would attract criticism. I suggest you take up the offer of further guidance’.

‘I can’t’. Replies Wood. ‘She’s retired early and is doing a motorbike tour of “Columbian commercial agriculture” with her 26 year old boyfriend’.

A little while later in Equality and Diversity Mandatory Training …

‘Do I really have to say “Good morning” to the person in the wheelchair first? What if I don’t know them? Won’t it look a little odd? And won’t it offend the person pushing the wheelchair that I am likely to know?’ Trees is incredulous at his new instruction on how to greet people of various abilities, ethnic backgrounds, genders and statures that he may encounter during his travels around the hospital.

‘This is best practice’ explains Equality and Diversity Trainer in a kind and patronising manner.

‘Who says’ retorts Trees. ‘In fact, show me the best practice for greeting a stranger in a wheelchair while being pushed by a familiar porter Handbook. Show me the evidence’.

‘I am sensing aggression in your tone doctor which is often a manifestation of prejudice and insecurity’ observes Equality and Diversity Trainer. ‘I should warn you that I have a PhD in Conflict Resolution’.

‘Well I am 3rd dan in Conflict Escalation’ stresses Trees ‘and I am offended by the way you are discriminating against me’.

‘I am not discriminating against you. I have never discriminated against anyone. I can’t, I am an Equality and Diversity Trainer. Apart from anything else you don’t fall into a category that can be discriminated against’ defends Equality and Diversity Trainer, beginning to look a little worried.

‘I am Jedi’ informs Trees ‘and my religion requires me to question anything that challenges the Force – and you are challenging the Force in a truly offensive manner. In fact the Force is so absent in you that your mere presence is an affront to a Jedi – as is Mandatory Training which is forbidden in the Jedi religion. Only the Force can show the way’.

‘I am so sorry’ chokes Equality and Diversity Trainer with tears beginning to stream. ‘I never realised that this training would be so offensive to a minority religious group with representation amongst our staff. I will immediately re-train in Equality and Diversity Training and I will inform Human Resources, the Chief Executive and our Medical Director that you should no longer receive Mandatory Training. I will also ask Human Resources to compile a list of Jedi followers in our staff so that they too can be exempt. I can only apologise for my lapse in judgement and the deficiency in my education’.

‘I accept your apology and insight’ says Trees, now looking calm and sage. ‘I shall inform my fellow Jedi of your enlightenment’.

‘Are there many of you?’ asks Equality and Diversity Trainer.

‘We’re about to become less of a minority than you think’ mutters Trees as he floats towards Wood’s office …