Four Yorkshiremen

December 11, 2019

In 1967, Monty Python aired a sketch in which four well-to-do men in an English club were reminiscing about the old days when they were poor. “The Four Yorkshiremen” was a classic that has been performed ever since in various iterations, one of them being at a Bailey family wedding. Part of the original went like this:

I was happier then and I had NOTHIN'. We used to live in this tiiiny old house, with greaaaaat big holes in the roof.

GC: House? You were lucky to have a HOUSE! We used to live in one room, all hundred and twenty-six of us, no furniture. Half the floor was missing; we were all huddled together in one corner for fear of FALLING!

TJ: You were lucky to have a ROOM! *We* used to have to live in a corridor!

MP: Ohhhh we used to DREAM of livin' in a corridor! Woulda' been a palace to us. We used to live in an old water tank on a rubbish tip. We got woken up every morning by having a load of rotting fish dumped all over us! House!? Hmph.

EI: Well when I say 'house' it was only a hole in the ground covered by a piece of tarpaulin, but it was a house to US.

GC: We were evicted from *our* hole in the ground; we had to go and live in a lake!

TJ: You were lucky to have a LAKE! There were a hundred and sixty of us living in a small shoebox in the middle of the road.

MP: Cardboard box?

TJ: Aye.

MP: You were lucky. We lived for three months in a brown paper bag in a septic tank.

On it went, getting more ridiculous and finally ending with, “You try to tell young people today that, they won’t believe ya.”

Today I changed the oil in my truck. It’s a nasty job when the weather is nice; it’s downright ugly when it’s cold and snowing. A heated garage with a lift would be nice, but I’m reduced to crawling around underneath the truck like a salamander, with caked on slush dripping in my face  as I feel my way to the oil pan and filter, contorting myself into a human pretzel to reach the latter so I can twist it off. There’s no way to do it without ending up with hot, dirty oil running down my arm. 

But at least I have a garage in which to do it. The floor was filthy, but I wasn’t having to crawl around in the snow. And I have all the tools I need to finish the job. I didn’t have to skip a meal to afford the oil and filter, and I still have the strength and flexibility to get down and up again and wrench that cursed old filter off. There was a time when everything except getting up and down would have been a challenge because I didn’t have the money, the place, or the tools to do the job, let alone the know-how.

So as the wind blew the snow across the yard, I lay on a garage floor thanking God for the privilege of changing my oil. It’s all in your perspective. Unlike the Four Yorkshiremen, I think I’m happier now.