William Shepherd

In 2005 I wrote Loves of My Life as Part Three of Aspects of Autobiography. It forced me to face up to some unsavoury episodes in my Life of Selfishness. The epicentre of this selfishness has shifted from The Man in my 20s and 30s to His Work in my 40s and 50s. I am proud to refer to myself in terms of One Man and His Work. But my approach to One Life as a Work of Art has a heavy cost…on others.

Any woman who wishes to share my life is given Hobson’s Choice. It comes wrapped up in charm and consideration but the bottom line is to accept second place. I am wary of the female of the species and…rightly or wrongly…I also regard myself as a very good catch for the right woman. I have yet to sell myself cheaply. The results have been excellent…I have enjoyed a series of long and happy relationships with remarkable women…and have escaped quickly before getting bogged down in bad relationships.

In Jane Austen’s day a farmer’s wife had a pretty good idea of what her husband did…and he about her. But the soldier’s wife understood little of her husband’s regimental life. In modern times the husband goes off to work each day so the wife has little idea what he does…and he about her. Both may make assumptions and at times both have glimpses. Connie probably had a fair idea of what I worked at when living with her in Rye but had little idea…and never asked…about my long periods away in Stockholm. We both made assumptions…which may have been right or wrong. Ingrid on the other hand had little idea about what I did all day. But she made assumptions and had glimpses.

One of these glimpses came in Welwyn Garden City in the spring of 1979. Our Massachusetts-based Corporate Paymasters visited occasionally…one boss at a time. But for reasons I forget a bunch of high-powered executives showed up with the lowliest being the boss of the boss of my boss. A reception was laid on and I just scraped onto the list in 12th place…out of 12 invited. The Americans brought their wives so we were commanded to display ours.

Ingrid and I were ten years younger than anyone else. For the first time she saw me as a Corporate Success. I saw it too…but reacted differently. I was horrified by my glimpse of what lay in store for me. Two days later I started planning my escape. Ingrid however was impressed at how far I had come…and how well she had coped in this alien world. So she was bewildered when I announced six weeks later that I was off to the States for three weeks…not on company business but to interview with Northern Telecom in Toronto, IFC in Washington and Bain & Co. in Boston. ‘I’ll be handing in my notice when I get back. The children will start at their American schools in September 1980'.

In the summer of 1979 the International Finance Corporation in Washington turned me down and so did Nixdorf and Bain & Co. in Boston…although they spent an inordinate amount of time and energy before doing so. But to Ingrid’s delight Northern Telecom wanted me in Toronto. Her joy was short-lived. I thought about it for 48-hours and then turned it down. Ingrid didn’t know I had fallen in love with Cambridge Massachusetts. Perhaps I should have taken the Toronto job. Two years later I discovered that my old college buddy Johnny Kingsley Watson was there making films. I would have left Telecoms and gone into Films, moved with him to Hollywood, met Victoria Tennant, saved her from Steve Martin and worked with Kevin Costner on Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. Aah! The paths not trod!

Ingrid’s next glimpse of my Workworld was in the spring of 1981. But I will begin the tale 10-years on in the 1990s when Salomons…America’s top Bond House as in Government Bond not James Bond…was embroiled in scandal. Dealers could only bid for 35% of new Government Bonds. Being greedy Salomons put in eight false bids totalling $13.5 billion in seven Treasury Bond Auctions between 1989 and 1991. Liar’s Poker by Michael Lewis tells the tale. Salomon’s sold the bonds on to favoured clients but were unlucky…or stupid…and got caught red-handed. In 1994 Paul Mozer…former head of the Government Securities Trading desk at Salomons…went to prison.

This marked the end of an era for Saloman Brothers who eventually merged with the insurance group Travelers and Smith Barney to form Salomon Smith Barney. When Travelers merged with Citibank later on the Saloman name disappeared. Today six out of ten want to quit The Rat Race for The Good Life. But 25 years ago this was far from being the majority view. I was still publicly on a fast track and felt the need to be circumspect. I was officially in high tech looking for opportunities when I met John Koch from Smith Barney’s Chicago Office at an MIT gathering.

Koch offered me loads of money to put together a team to pick Wall Street winners with System Dynamics models. Two months later we gave our presentation on High-Tech High-Growth companies…and the difference in Research Spending at Data General and Digital Equipment. Koch was working the phones the moment we finished…pulling his clients’ money out of Data General and piling it into Digital. By year-end he was seriously rich.

After that I saw Koch just once. Our invoice was paid immediately but he insisted on taking us out to dinner...all wives included. For one evening Ingrid had a fleeting glimpse of her husband high-rolling with…and being lavishly praised by…Serious Money and Academic Excellence. Tangible evidence that our move to the States was a success. Two months later I fell in love with another woman...and left Ingrid alone in a strange country with no family or friends and two young children. She was bewildered. Fortunately she was and is a remarkable woman.

Premiere Night at the Royal Albert Hall for Sir Paul McCartney’s Ecce Cor Meum tonight. I was impressed with his underappreciated Liverpool Oratorio. Lesley Brownbill was dismissive of the idea of a Ryesingers performance next year. ‘Out of his depth’ was her reaction…with ‘He didn’t write it himself anyway!’ thrown in for good measure.

Fiona wrote in the Daily Mirror on Saturday 21st October…the page was marked 2004 but the rest of the paper was 2006…about the time she met Paul McCartney. ‘He offered me a cuppa as soon as we shook hands and he talked passionately about his wife.’ ‘I love her because she interests me. Every day she does something that interests me,’ he had said when she asked about his marriage. But he was not talking about Heather Mills…but Linda Eastman.

Linda was the love of Paul’s life. He could have done with her wise counsel in the torrid weeks since he split from Heather…his second wife. Their separation and divorce proceedings become nastier by the week. Fiona again. ‘Linda was never one to talk about their relationship but it was clear that family was at the heart of everything she did. She once asked for my mum’s address after I told her mum couldn’t understand why I was vegetarian. ‘I’ll write to her,’ she said. And she did.’ The evidence suggests Heather is not like that. Her priority is Heather…and always has been.

I have known the type…and it is not good news. The type is driven by deep feelings of inadequacy which spring from low self-esteem following perceived or actual rejection by the father. A particular intriguing feature is the ability to mask true personality. Outside the intimacy of the relationship…and inside too before winning the man…this type comes across as charming and caring. But it is a pose.

Alone together with her man, low self-esteem kicks in…laced with resentment of his success and fear of her own failure and ‘being found out’. The natural behavioural outlet for the subsequent frustration is to take every opportunity to put the man down. Initially this will only happen in private. But the better the man and the bigger his success the greater the frequency. I would guess she made Paul’s life hell.

I make a point of listening to The Archers on BBC Radio Four if I am back onboard by seven in the evening. David and Ruth’s 18-year marriage is on the rocks. First David was charmed and flattered by ex-girlfriend Sophie who suddenly turns up…divorced. Sophie has the makings of my Bad News Type but the scriptwriters did not develop the character. Eventually David sees the error of his ways. But too late…perhaps…because meanwhile Ruth has fallen head over heels in love with Farmhand Sam. Which way will she jump? We are all sitting on the edge of our seats!

Perhaps Paul’s money would be better spent on the Genetic Scientist Giovanna Cominero at the University of Pavia in Italy instead of a Fleece of Barristers at the Inns of Court in London. Giovanna studied a family of four sons…who should have been women...and discovered a gene that provides the Essence of Womanhood.

I have long known that the male has two different chromosomes…an X and a Y…while the female has a double helping of one or the other. But I never managed to remember if the double helping was a Y or an X until I looked at the shape of the letter ‘Y’ and decided it looked like percy being pointed at the porcelain...with acknowledgements to Barry Humphries.

Whenever I try to wrap my head around the idea of a Genetic Revolution transforming the Human Condition I get a niggling Valves-in-the-Television feeling. Understanding a valve does not explain the pictures. Woman has this stunning ability to replicate herself…and many himselves too. The sperm-giving male has big mobility advantages over the egg-bearing female. But how much does any of this matter if we are Receivers and Transmitters?

Cast your eyes over a crowd and you will be looking at trillions upon trillions of genes. Look at the same crowd three years later and every cell, gene and chromosome you gazed upon 3-years earlier will have been replaced. We completely reproduce ourselves every few years…something that intrigues Personality and Consciousness researchers.

In this crowd there are three times as many X-chromosomes as Y-ones. Is this significant? Mendel and many generations of Fruitfly Aficionados never make predictions…they assess probabilities. Dominant and Recessive Genes, a Double Helix Structure that combines bits from one parent with bits from the other…and much else that has yet to be discovered…would seem to swamp any diversity effects imparted by one chromosome buried in the DNA.

Cominero’s team studied the case of a family of four infertile brothers and told their tale in The Journal of Nature Genetics. Gender is chiefly determined by sex chromosomes. In rare cases people with the male X-Y profile develop as women. More rarely those with the female Double-X profile become male. A gene called SRY that sits on the Y-chromosome seems to be the primary trigger of male development.

But the Italians have now shown that every woman owes her femininity to another gene…RSPO1. At least one copy of this RSPO1-gene must be present for an embryo to develop as a female…or it develops as a male…even with two X-chromosomes and no SRY-gene. Strange.

Each brother had the Double-X female profile. Each brother also had the SRY-gene in the wrong place. But each brother had a mutated version of this RSPO1-gene. ‘Poor Boy! Poor Boy!’ as I have been exclaiming all week. Sir W.S. Gilbert’s words were first heard on 13th April 1880 at the Opéra Comique. It is hard to be an Orphan Boy. But having a Double X with no SRY and a mutant RSPO1 must be the Essence of Genetic Poverty...and in Italy too.