Liberal Youth: a unexpected intimation of mortality

There I was, minding my own business when, rather unexpectedly, the skinny guy in the black, hooded cloak carrying the very sharp piece of farm equipment looked me in the eye and said, "Have you really looked at that last manifesto for Liberal Youth?".

I admitted that I hadn't, after all, you know how it is, it's early in the morning, or late the night before, that kind of thing, and I'm looking for gratuitous offence rather than paying close attention to the purple prose. So I had another look. "Date of birth, ......... 1993."...

And with that, my heart sank. Oh yes, I had begun to accept the fact that my sporting heroes are younger than I am, that policemen, the Party Leader and, for that matter, a whole bunch of our Parliamentary candidates are younger. But to discover that I am now Returning Officer to people nearly thirty, yes thirty years, younger than I am is a bit of a blow to the solar plexus of the soul.

Perhaps all I have to look forward to is a gradual decline into senescence and the 'Twilight Home for Confused Returning Officers', although I have no doubt that Ros will have something to say on the subject. However, I don't intend to wait, and it's time to rage into the bureaucratic night.

Look out Liberal Youth, the Returning Officer is on a mission...