The Summer of Love

Ah yes, 1967. By July I'd had enough of school and they'd had enough of me. I managed to get my summer job back at Ffyffes Bananas, and resisted any questions about careers etc. My school friends Andrew Brazier and Dave O'Callaghan both applied for jobs in the bank, so for no other reason than "why not?", I applied too.
The education system of the mid sixties was very stratified. I took and passed my 11 plus exam and went to grammar school. After the first year's internal exams, the brightest 25% were put into an elite stream, who then went on to take their O level exams at the end of the 4th year, rather than the fifth. This meant that the brightest ones had taken their A levels and were on  their way to University by the time they were 17. I'm a big fan of streaming pupils according to their ability. If you keep the bright ones in with the duffers, they get dragged down and never achieve their potential.
By some fluke I found myself in the A stream in the second year, and from then on I struggled to keep up. I managed to pass five O levels at the end of the fourth year, but this wasn't enough to get a place in the sixth form, so I stayed another year in the upper fifth, passed another O level and called it a day.
My grammar school was all male. There was a girls school next door and we'd spend the breaktimes shouting obscenities through the fence. My experience of girls was nil when I left school. I could, however, blush for England. I was a lanky spotty youth who was awkward, always in trouble for having long hair, and a dreamer. I'd just learnt how to play the guitar and it was my consuming passion.
So why did I opt for a career in the bank?
My parents had both passed their 11 plus exams, but grammar schools were fee paying in the 1930s, so they couldn't go. My father had to go out to work at the age of 14, and there was a lot of pressure from my parents to get a proper job. Playing music was not a proper job, despite the fortunes that could be made then.
The careers that were open to grammar school educated teenagers with average O level results were, commerce, banking or the civil service. I answered three adverts in the paper and went for  interviews.
The first was at Thomas Cook. It was a grim place. I was interviewed by two grim people. They asked me why I wanted to work for them. They told me that whistling wasn't allowed in the corridors, and that all male staff had to wear grey suits with either white or grey shirts. And a plain tie.
And this was the summer of love.Kaftans, flowers in your hair, cowbells as necklaces.

My next interview was with the civil service. I can't remember much about it. Basically, if you turned up every day, stayed out of trouble and turned in an above mediocre performance, you had a job for life. The only sacking offence was consistent lateness.
Next.

My next interview was with the Westminster Bank. It was like the other two, but paid better.

And so it was, that on September 29th 1967, I turned up for work at the Chiswick High Road branch of the Westminster Bank.

Welcome to the rest of your life. As if.