The Common Touch

How dare he.

How dare he.

HOW DARE HE.

Teeth clench in rictus of rage. Head oscillates axially in frisson of unbridled wrath. All blood is squeezed from ivory fists by clenching spasms of  unparalleled umbrage. At last anger abates sufficiently to allow the resumption of typing...

I won't stoop to name the muck-raking, moronically opinionated, scumbag journalist who triggered the outburst; suffice it to say he is the supposed 'society editor' of the New York Times, on the cheap, sullied pages of which he this morning declared me to be 'out of touch with the common worker'. Me. Me, out of touch with the common worker. I... I... words fail me.

I know what you are saying. It's not like him. He's not himself. Why isn't he making a joke of it like he always does? And you are right to be shocked. Ordinarily, as you well know, I laugh at these things. Who are journalists, after all, but mediocre talents, tainted with resentment of real writers, typing whatever fanciful notions best serve their embittered fantasies of avengement. In my lofty and prominent station, the flaccid arrows of a spiteful press are an environmental constant, like the very air itself, and I am usually numb to them. However, this morning's poisoned barb has hit my one psychologically sensitive spot- my working class identity.

Was I not born of a poor family in the 'north end' of Mayfair, virtually the epitome of a working class community? Was I not driven to school in an old hand-me-down Daimler? Have I not reached my position of eminence by struggling against every disadvantage of class? Naturally, I am set apart from  'the common worker' in attainment, but in all other respects we are the same. Don't I rise each day at 6, just like the common worker? Don't I leave for work at 8, just like the common worker, after the shower, the swim, the sauna and the massage? Don't I do the Sudoku, just like the common worker, as I'm driven to work? Don't I stand patiently in my private lift, as I rise to my office, just like common workers in lifts and elevators across the world? Don't I suffer the same petty frustrations as the common worker- tedious clients, like Obama and Putin, the queried expenses for the fortnight in Acapulco.

Journalists. I sometimes wonder how they make it all up.