I never met David, but I knew him for almost ten years – I think. I didn’t ever speak to him in real life, or on the phone, I never heard his voice – although he had such a distinctive way of communicating I feel that I did. I wrote, he responded. He was always honest, always “spoke” his mind – disagreeing as any friend might when I mentioned something he didn’t agree with, or had an opinion on. For example, he always enjoyed my stories about former times – my adventures, and those of my dad before he married, and my mum before they married each other. He particularly liked my stories about Manchester because that was where he was born, before his family moved abroad. However, he didn’t like my opinion pieces, or serious stuff – not that he disagreed with them (although I have a feeling he might have) but I think he read my ordinary ramblings as a way of escape.
I never met him, I never asked anything personal, although when we “spoke” about Manchester I would ask about generalities of his early life in the west side of the city. He would however “talk” – again in generalities, about his early life in the west side of Manchester, around the Trafford area, I think. He would talk about his life, his wife’s wonderful cooking, and I guessed he had been married several times, but with this partner he found peace and was happy. I think he had an adventurous life, and sometimes a very hard life, and I think it had not always been a happy time, although he was tough and soldiered on.
He loved my pub stories – those about my dad’s early life in The Portland Arms in Cambridge, about our local pub here in Uphill – the Dolphin, and about the various other pubs I’ve known and visited over the years. However, it was the Dolphin that he imagined visiting and meeting me and my family and friends and having a few pints of Otter. I so often wish I could now write something about him visiting in real life, our visits to the Dolph, our visits to other pubs, our little adventures in search of decent beer in a friendly and pleasant and interesting public house.
Our dear pub, the Dolphin, has changed. Oh, it has seen many changes over the years, mostly positive, some a little odd, some a little challenging, but the spirit of the Dolphin has survived. I guess it might be the type of different people who are regulars, the consistently decent landlords (although some have been less decent than others) the locals, the visiting holiday makers, the tradition of families who come through their generations. In the past, whoever was behind the bar, whoever’s name was above the door, the Dolphin was the Dolphin.
I know David would be so upset, anxious and probably somewhat annoyed that a change has been wrought on our beloved the pub, which has destroyed – a strong word, but I can think of no other, destroyed, the spirit of the Dolphin. It was in need of redecoration and modernisation for sure, there were parts of it that were severely neglected. But somehow now its spirit has been broken, and you walk in and it’s anonymous, bland, unfriendly – yes, unbelievably, the atmosphere is no longer welcoming.
Many of us locals soldier on – but people I know only from having seen them there are sharing their thoughts on this eatery, formerly a beloved pub, that it is soulless. If I walked in for the first time, I would think it bland, lacking atmosphere, uninteresting, unwelcoming (yes, I know I’m repeating myself).
I cling on to the thought that change has happened so many times in this pub, even before I first knew it and it has always survived – but it has in the past survived as itself. Now it is no longer itself. it is a stranger, and an unwelcoming stranger.
Lois Elsden 