Age Anxiety
Johan started working at the age of 11. In a family with many children, there is no money to send everyone to school. At the age of less than 11, he had back problems but continued working because his parents wanted him to.
On Fridays, he received his meagre salary in a bag and after a glass of gin, he gave it to his father when he got home, who was sitting in the armchair smoking a pipe and confiscated the money without deigning to look at him.
So Johan continued working in the harbour and looked with some envy at the boys from the poorhouse who stood cheerfully on the deck waving to the people on the quay. How much he would have liked to sail to a better destination.
At the age of 56, Johannes was allowed to retire and would receive a benefit if he asked for it and he looked forward to it. The work in the harbour was hard for him and his back made it difficult to continue working, but he persevered. In the meantime, he had worked for 44 years and after work he could not take a step. Not long after, he received a letter stating that the retirement age had changed. From now on, everyone had to work until they were 73.4 years old. Johannes groaned and could not stand it anymore. He had not even been a child for 11 years of his life and every cent he had earned had been spent on someone else.
He had looked forward to his well-earned retirement at the age of 56 and had struggled to keep himself on his feet. At that age, he would have done 45 years of hard physical work and now, because of a civil servant who was serving his time behind a desk, another 17 years had been added.
Dejected, he sat on a crate and stared at the water. The water was grey but looked calm. There was no ship at anchor and the seagulls had flown away,
What do you think, a voice roared, get to work, lazy bugger!
It was Neptune, the god of the sea, who appeared behind John and scared the living daylights out of him.
You may be dead but you still have 17 years of work ahead of you!
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