The Judicial Review about plans for Stonehenge is due (story in today’s Guardian) but it reminded me of an incident that happened long ago. It has stuck in my mind.
If you head west out of London and take the A303, eventually something incredible happens. For most people it is somewhere after Andover. On the horizon, there appears a huge stone circle, a 5,000 year old miracle of engineering that even today no one knows quite how it was achieved. Stonehenge. But that day in 1995, for me it happened at the Little Chef restaurant a few miles east.
I had left London early to avoid traffic, not even grabbing a cup of tea. When I saw the sign, I turned in - then immediately regretted it. The car park was empty. The place was clearly not yet open, but I tried the door and it opened.
There were no diners at any of the tables and no staff around. I went to a table and sat down, making sure I scraped the chair and made some noise. I sat there for five minutes before the kitchen door swung open and a young waitress came striding towards me. Her face was like thunder.
"Can't you read," she snapped at me.
It's always a shock when someone does not behave by the rules, the unwritten code of courtesy that British society gently rubs along with. Before I could answer she pointed an angry finger towards the entrance. "Look."
There was a sign that read, "Welcome. Please wait to be seated."
"Oh right, sorry. I thought, since the place was empty..."
She bunched up her fists. I thought she might explode, or implode, or both. "Go and wait to be seated."
I actually got up to walk out. My anger was roused now. But as I passed the sign, something made me stop. It was called hunger - and the sight of a large group of potential customers coming towards the door. If I was to eat, this was my only chance for a long time.
So I stood there, at the head of the queue. After a few minutes the kitchen door opened and the same girl came out, her face full of smiles but not recognition. "Table for one, Sir?"
She led me back to the very same spot that I had vacated five minutes earlier.
I think about that waitress sometimes. She was trying to make her world work in the way it was meant to. She succeeded.
This cracked me up. I once went to a lobster shack in Maine. There were two windows in the wall, and not a customer in sight.
I went to the first window and a young woman appeared to ask if she could help. I told her I wanted to order some food, upon which she directed me to the other window, where, she said, orders were taken.
I did as instructed, only to have exactly the same young woman appear at the other window. To. Ask. Me. If. She. Could. Help.....