Hitch-hiking, charm and fiction - from Becca

Antonia's account reminds me also of hitching procedures Mark employed.
Never lost for words Mark would manage to make the driver feel good
whether that was by listening, talking or effusive thanks. All totally
authentic, if occasionally excess to requirements. What wasn't genuine
was the flavour and type of degree he was studying. If asked he was
doing Sociology at Warwick, History at Essex - anything apart but
Classics at Oxford. He did it out of sensitivity to class, status and
the hitchhiking contract and also mood - he couldn't have born to kill
the conversation. And if the truck driver did want to pursue it, he
was, of course completely able to bring any subject alive with fact or
opinion or a thoughtful chew of his forefinger.