"I Like Getting Older"

(Short story in response to the pic - a 15 minute unplanned writing piece from my writers' group)

I sit in the dingy staff kitchen waiting for the inevitable morning rush of those less organised with time-keeping than I am. I hate people who aren't on time. Lack of care for others. Lack of respect. Lack of discipline. I always get to the office by 8.30am at the latest - then there's time for coffee and my morning sudoku. What these others don't realise is that 9am is when you are contracted to start working - not when you are contracted to start making a morning drink.

And here they come...

"Aw, fuck man - Ah wis pure wasted! Ah'm tellin ye!"

"Aye man. Ah saw ye chattin up that burd. Ye wir all over her!"

"She wis pure gaggin fir it..."

The obnoxious voices growing gradually louder as they reach the kitchen door...

"Aye, fuck man... Oh, morning Miss Clarke."

The two men who have just ruined my silent sudoku solitude with their cheap-suited, loud-tied entrance stifle giggles as they remove their cotas and head for the kettle.

I just nod a refined greeting and go back to my sudoku...

But I can still hear them, yapping like excited gibbons as they make their coffee...

Booze - "pure cheap, man!"

Burds - "hot as fuck!"

Parents - "Ma maw wis ragin, man!"

Friends - "He's been pure doin ma heid in."

I listen to their inane ramblings. The ramblings of youth. Of ignorance and short sightedness.

I remember it.

I do.

I was once the drinker, the flirter, the shagger, the trouble-making daughter, the unreliable friend. The youngster.

I like getting older.

L Stokes 1st August 2006