Liz, all you say may be true but I always considered working for Noble and Lund was a wonderful experience. The shock of leaving school and starting work at the ungodly time of 07:30 was difficult but make no mistake, I had more fun and happiness working for Noble and Lund as a fitter than you could ever imagine. There was a camaraderie within that small but energetic engineering company which will never be seen again. None of us working there would ever become rich with money. We would have to move on. However, there was pride in seeing some of the worlds biggest (and best) machine tools of their time leave the little town of Felling. In a lifetime of never having been out of work, I feel my entry into this seemingly insignificant factory was its common denominator.

Just today I received an email from a friend in Canada. This sums it up for me. Hopefully it will for others of my age too.
This is what my friend wrote.

"We are the Elderly.
This quiet label hides something most people rarely stop to consider. We are the last living witnesses of a world which no longer exists. We crossed two centuries Lived eight decades of transformation. Walked from handwritten letters to artificial intelligence – and never lost our sense of what actually matters"

Hey Ye, Joe- My name is George - I'm 90 years old next year and feel I succeeded in life. Not in spite of you, probably because of you and others like you but I never realised at the time. Like him or loathe him, Joe the Mush got things done.