OUCH! CORRECTION

by Reg Green

     Last week in this column I said I returned home from a trip to mark my 94th birthday to find that my wife had bought three pairs of socks for me and I wondered how I could wear them out before I went to the place where bare feet are compulsory.

It turned out to be worse than I thought. Her online order was for two sets of three pairs. It was a kindly act but I’ve now got a pile of socks as big as the National Debt.

Happily, the age of miracles hasn’t passed. I have five children and I’ve been tossing and turning for months about what to leave them in my will. Plus one widow. Now, when the time comes, I will have twelve well-worn (I hope) socks and twelve second-hand feet, so to speak. What clearer confirmation can there be that Pangloss, Voltaire’s optimistic philosopher, was right to believe that, however bad things seem, in truth all is for the best in this best of all possible worlds?