The Milk Run When the milk lorry stopped on the
very steepest part of the hill, I was surprised. The driver poked his head out of the cab and offered me a lift. I was enjoying myself. The lift hardly mattered, for the day was my own and I had stopped looking at my watch, but I accepted. I wanted to ride with the milk churns, to clatter and rock along the road and recapture an old thrill. I climbed up, noting that milk lorries are much higher than they used to be. Much noisier too, I discovered. The driver and I could only grin at each other. He grinned, I imagine because he thought I had never ridden with the milk before, and I because he was wrong. Long ago, coming off a night train, I used to stand on the road with my luggage by my side and wait for the milk churns so that I could arrive at the farm road-end early and take everyone by surprise. It was part of the delight of home-coming, that journey that was broken at familiar places so that empties could be unloaded. Here I was, far from my native country- side, jolting and clattering into the hills of Wales on the same sort of bright morning, soon after cock-crow. I' was enjoying an old experience and discovering that some pleasures change very little in twenty-five years.
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