YEAR END

I love this time of year. Late April. The sun bursting through the clouds, the field grass growing crazily, lush shades of green everywhere you look. The dew heavy and soaking in the mornings. Elder Daughter was down and we walked together across the railway meadows in the growing dusk. Suddenly she gave a cry. ‘Slugs!’

Little bits of beige slime covered the thick grass. Everywhere. As we crossed the field there appeared to be no fewer, no less, wherever we went. I did a calculation - let’s say 30 to the square yard, 150,000 to the acre, so in this field of 10 acres, there must be 1.5 million. That’s an awful lot of slugs - all looking identical, like peas in a pod. I suppose they were recently hatched - perhaps something to do with last summer’s rain - and now were eating the damp grass. Nothing that I could see was eating them. A feast for the ducks, I thought, if there were to be any ducks.

Elder Daughter had come over as she had been offered a greenhouse if she could demolish it and take it away. That’s where I came in. Not only am I labour when it comes to demolishing greenhouses but I drive a car with a boot capacity of 2000 litres with the seats out. Enough for a couple of greenhouses.

That was last weekend. As I write this it is the end of our financial year: April 30. One of the best year ends you can have if you are self-employed for in effect you pay tax eleven months later than would be the case if your tax year ended a mere twenty-five days earlier. Nowadays I believe the Inland Revenue take a dim view of people who claim such advantageous year ends; but in my case it was genuine.

Twenty-four years ago - on 1 May 1984 - I found myself at the offices of what was then Allied Hambro for the purpose of being trained to sell life assurance, something that I came to regret almost instantly. But by then it was too late. Selling is not my forte. I would have difficulty in selling ice cream to Arabs, or sand to Esquimaux, so I found selling life assurance impossible and departed soon afterwards. Nevertheless my year end - or, to be strictly accurate, my year beginning - had been established.

Now, of course, labels are my principal work. In between came an eclectic variety of activities but always each financial year has ended on 30 April. It is the day one asks ‘how did we do?’ And I look for the headline total. Contrary to what might appear sensible from the point of tax, I always look for a successful final week and especially to a final productive day to round off the year nicely.

And what happened this year? Nothing! We did not take a single order all day. The telephone remained dead as though cut off. As though all our customers, who on other days ring demanding labels for yesterday, had departed on a slow boat to China. I was left twiddling my thumbs in frustration while gazing out of the window at the ivy and the rain.

In between these bouts of twiddling I did some unenthusiastic research for a European article I have to write. Sometimes, these articles are easy; the subject stands out, it is easy to find something to say. At other times the bricks are many and the straws few. The whole European Continent is walking on eggshells, or so it seems, until the Ireland goes to the polls on 12 June. Only in the Balkans, as ever, are there developments.

Despite the lack of orders I have two small deliveries to make. Donning an anorak I head into the pouring rain towards the post box, jiffy bags in hand. On the way I meet a distant neighbour. She has the bowed appearance of someone in their late seventies who has seen better times. Her hair is permed and steely grey. She dresses with respectable convention and looks vacant. She walks slowly with a stick. I don’t know her name, in fact before today I had not even spoken to her.

She had been caught in this downpour without coat or umbrella and, shopping bag in hand, was battling through it as best she could. I asked her if I could lend an umbrella, which was a bit silly as I did not have an umbrella on me. I could fetch one from the car I said. In a soft Highland accent that reminded me of Janet from Dr Finlay’s casebook she replied that she was much ‘obliged’ to me - what a comforting old-fashioned word that is - but she had no need of an umbrella; she lived only around the corner. And with that she proceeded on her way. I felt nevertheless that the day had not been entirely wasted.