After they were famous

Diana Spencer and Elvis Presley were never really dead at all. They both work at Marks and Spencers in Aberdeen. I thought everybody knew that! Whenever anybody says to them "You look just like ... " they smile and say "Everyone says that!" They take it all in their stride. The reality is that nobody believes it's really them either.  You’re not expecting to see them in Scotland are you?  That's as good as being invisible.

At the cash and wrap, or sometimes on the customer service desk, sits the woman clearly labelled Diane Windsor. Just coincidence that one letter on her name badge is wrong.  Occasionally I have seen her on the shop floor putting clothes out on the racks, but not very often. There are a few lads out there who say "that bird don't 'alf look like Princess Di".  She might even be working the fact that people think she looks so alike.

The reality could have been they'd had enough of public life and just wanted the everyday normality that the rest of us have taken for granted.  For Diana that is going down the pub with all her mates after work sometimes and getting cod and chips on Friday night from the chip shop she passes on the way home.  Doing her food shopping at Asda on Saturday morning, if she isn’t working, and going into school every Wednesday afternoon to hear little kids reading after having her spaghetti hoops on toast for lunch in the staff room.  Now Elvis, I haven’t seen him about for a while but he probably is retired now anyway.  He mentioned it last time we spoke and said he was semi-retired already but couldn’t quite let go of work.  “I like my job” he said “In December I work every day we’re open, I always have”.  He was looking forward to having time to do more activities.  I know he plays a lot of golf, goes fishing and hill walking.  There’s plenty of opportunity for all that in Scotland.  He even talked about doing the artificial ski-slope near the University. “If I bust a leg doing it, I won’t spend my dying hours wondering what it would have been like to go skiing”.  While I don’t think he’ll ever be skinny, he has lost a lot of weight and looks better for it. 

Last time I was in Marks and Spencer’s, when Di was telling me about their bargain shirts for a fiver that were coming in next month, I happened to mention I was going down to Glasgow while I was on holiday and her face lit up.  “I love Glasgow, I haven’t been there for ages” she said with the enthusiasm of someone who knew the city really well.  If anything she spoke like someone native to Glasgow.  “You do know, don’t you, that you can buy a City to City coach ticket online for £2.50 return?  That’s what I always do”.  Well, gone are her days of chaperone and being chauffeur driven each way.

They have both gone where nobody would expect to find them.  It reminds me a bit of the story I used to read my daughter, where the spell cast by the wicked witch ensured that if the mother came across any of her family or friends they would not recognise her.  That’s how it is for Diana and Elvis, except they are very happy in their new lives.