A MAN who has lost his job, is behind on his mortgage and buys groceries on a credit card is consoled by the knowledge that he is middle-class.
Freelance marketing consultant Tom Logan has been let go by his employers, is deeply in debt and could soon be homeless, but still knows the best olive oil to dip ciabatta in.
He said: “Sure, things aren’t great financially at the moment. I may ending up living in the old Kia Sportage for a few months. But I read the broadsheet papers at the library.
“They can’t take my liberal, educated outlook on life. No matter what happens I won’t have a coarse regional accent. Even when I’m shopping at Aldi I have the bearing of a man who shops at Waitrose.
“I remain the kind of man who knows about Gabriel García Márquez. I haven’t read any but I intend to, which is the main thing. If I were to mention Gabriel García Márquez to that warehouse supervisor who turned me down for a job the other day, he’d think he was United’s latest signing.
“Even when he was telling me I couldn’t earn minimum wage on a zero-hours contract, he called me ‘Mr Logan’ and ‘Sir’. I told him he could call me ‘Tom’ but he didn’t and I see his point. There’s a gulf between us.
“At the end he shook my hand and you could tell he’d never been to grammar school or Sicily. Which, destitute as I am, remains a great comfort to me.”
