Have you ever been stuck in a job that bores you rigid, but you just can’t see a way out? It happens, especially to men as they move towards retirement. They become trapped. Either they can’t do without the money or they don’t want to lose face with fellow workers. So they soldier on with one wistful eye on the exit door.
I was reminded of this when I chanced upon Ronnie Wood in an airport recently. Hobbling by, he looked as if he’d like to be on the settee in his slippers with a nice hot cup of tea, but his job forces him to squeeze his unwilling legs into a pair of leather trousers while persuading himself that the juvenile blonde fingering his arm finds attractions in him beyond his bank balance.
Does he really, at his age, want to flaunt his arthritis while his chum claims to be Jumping Jack Flash? And I could see how desperately he would like to have ripped that bizarre wig off his head and have a good scratch.
But there it is. He’s a Rolling Stone – and he’s stuck with it.
David Beckham is another. Most men of his age have realised that running round a field in a pair of short trousers chasing inflated pigskin isn’t the thing to do when you’re well into your fourth decade.
But if he gives it up, he’ll just become “Mr Posh” – which even I’d consider humiliating.
And what about that unfortunate Davina woman who’s cemented to the Big Brother programme? She can’t still enjoy exchanging sub-trivia with single-brain-cell embryos.
It can be so difficult to get out of high-profile jobs. Had they chosen a less limelight occupation, such as Prime Minister, it would have been so much easier for them.
I’m sure Gordon Brown is getting bored. Can you imagine an endless procession of fat-filled lunches, untrustworthy workmates, fine wines you’re not allowed to get pissed on and tedious teas with Betty? Surely he can’t enjoy having to get out of bed at all hours of the morning to explain himself to an ill-tempered Today programme disc-jockey and then spend the rest of his day apologising to everyone he meets for letting them down?
I’m sure that, secretly, he wants to chuck that tie, down that pint, light that spiff, grow that ponytail, shake that booty and take a tent down to Glastonbury with the lads.
Although Gordon seems to be trapped in a striped suit and an appointments diary, he can do something about it. He only needs to make himself unpopular and he’s liberated.
He could, for example, fetch back old personnel who are thoroughly despised and inherently treacherous. This gambit would show the Labour Party where he’s headed, which is basically backwards.
Or he could work on giving himself an utterly incredible image. He could pretend to be his own antithesis: a grinning happy-chappy, the sort of person who rings up discredited former Daily Mirror editors to ask how contestants in talent contests are faring.
He could distance himself from the activists in his party who he relies on to get him elected. A useful tactic might be to ignore them when it comes to dishing out well-paid ministerial jobs, handing them out to television personalities instead. It’s the opposite of sugaring the pill.
Bolder still, he could ape all the policies of the opposition – the ones that so appal his own party activists. Things like selling off the family plastic (now that the silver’s gone), spouting about being Mr Law and Order, outbidding the other side on hanging, flogging and keeping people in custody without trial. Selling the Royal Mail is a prime card in any exit strategy. It doesn’t matter that there is now virtually no Royal Mail left to sell; it’s the fact that he’s promised in blood he wouldn’t do it.
Another trump card would be to involve himself in as many unpopular wars as he can find. Even better would be to change his mind constantly about exactly why we are sending British troops to be murdered in obscure foreign fields. Like Afghanistan, where we are fighting because otherwise al Qaida will invade Kensington (Monday), the Taliban won’t let women go to school (Tuesday), we’ve got obligations to the United Nations, (Wednesday), we’re waging a war on drugs, (Thursday), we need to keep oil flowing across that country (Friday), because otherwise our soldiers will have died pointlessly (Saturday), or to bring peace to the world (Sunday).
Yes, it’s much easier for the PM to quit his job than it is for popular entertainers, and as his old chum Tony Blair has shown, he’s not going to find himself on a Jobseekers’ allowance when he’s escaped. Tony pulled down £400,000 for two half-hour speeches in the Philippines and pocketed £237,000 for a three-hour trip to Dongguan, a luxury Chinese housing estate. Think what he could have got from the developed world.
And Gordon won’t have to jump around the stage while some other bus-pass holder mentions that it’s a gas, gas, gas.
That’s why I feel sorry for poor old Ronnie. And us.
