Who said truth was stranger than fiction? I was ushering at Snape tonight, on the main door with a chap I hadn't met before, called Dick. He was of a certain age, or to put it another way, old. We chatted as you do, and at some point he told me he was - not had been, still was - an optomotrist. So I told him my story which continues to amuse me after six years. When we first moved to Wilby our friend Judy recommended an optician in Halesworth, Jeffries by name, "but ask for young Mr Jeffries," she said. When I turned up for my eye test an elderly man introduced himself as Mr Jeffries. "I was told to see young Mr Jeffries," I told him smiling broadly. "That's me," he replied. "You should see my father!" So I'm telling Dick this, and he laughs and says, "That's me. I'm old Mr Jeffries, and I'm still working!" And I thought he was joking so I looked closely at his name tag, and sure enough it said Dick Jeffries. And I buried my head in his shoulder and squeezed his arm and moaned, "No, no, it can't be you, this is excruciating." And he laughed and laughed, and said, Wait till I tell my wife. He's 82, and his son who I mistook for him was only 52 when I first met him. As Dick said, Chris was born old! We're best friends now. We've bonded and shared a joke, which practically makes us family.
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