The greatest blessing of old friends is that
you can get away with being stupid with them. Thus spoke Emerson, I think.
Thank heavens someone thought so, as I have, in one way or another, been stupid
with most of mine – occasionally in multiple ways at the same time. Being once
described as having ‘a great brain but with bits missing’ left me wondering
whether I ever had the right to excuse myself or not.
Last Wednesday, I received an unexpected email,
via this website, from an old friend with whom I have had no contact for
several years, and not seen since July 1991. That is an appallingly long time for
me to neglect someone who was innately kind and honest. Way too long. The
two-year-old son with curly red hair and striking eyes, playing cricket on the
front-room carpet, will now be in his mid-twenties, as I myself was when I saw
him. I can but ask forgiveness.
In the two years that El Escritor Inglés has been afloat, I must have received thousands of emails, from all parts of the world, the vast majority of which have
been friendly and thoughtfully written. I have been fortunate enough, too, to
receive offers of sponsorship and for the site to display advertisement links
with free software products thrown in with the commission. None of it warrants
serious consideration. I would rather readers know that, first, I am not
writing in order to broadcast views which might not reflect my own; and that,
further, I have no wish to make money. It will remain a serial labour of love.
I wish I could find time to correspond with
everyone – to say thank you, if nothing more. Today, however, I should like to indulge
myself just once by sending an open letter in return.
For the past few days, countless different words,
images and sounds have flitted through my head: ’60s Motown; Woodstock; coloured pasta shells;
a brown Vauxhall Nova; hand-written
correspondence; scorers I could never be troubled to trouble; note-perfect
barbershop harmonies; Shakespeare’s Sonnet 30; a long-leg fieldsman; a
single-leg epidural; overshooting Newcastle and ending up in Scotland; the peal
of church bells during a last-wicket run chase; a rucked-up tarmac path between
two rows of bungalows; undergraduate nights spent reading anything that wasn’t
on the syllabus; pints of Ward’s best sludge which I was, mercifully, never old
enough to be served; not knowing one end of Edinburgh from the other; not
knowing one end of a cricket bat from the other; a green-and-white rugby shirt
complementing jeans with the customary hole in the crotch (check your photo); the
coincidence of a Sixth Form Maths teacher who looked (to me) like Jesus after a
fortnight in Marbella; former team-mates (Savage, Littlewood, Hammerton et al.)
who are gone but never forgotten; the fact that Durham Cathedral is, and
forever will be, York Minster sort of back to front (you’re smiling); listening
to Phoebe Snow singing Every Night
and howling along to it in the bath (you’re laughing); and, I hope, a sun that
shines most brightly in the hour before it sets.
Yes,
the rain man with the elephant’s memory remembers, you know; and he does so
with unwavering fondness.
My
friend, and all your tribe, this one is just for you (Figures 47.1 to 47.4).
Figure
47.1: Postcard from the past
Copyright
© 2011 Google Maps
Figure
47.2: Spot the difference
Copyright
unknown
Figure
47.3: The North East branch committee of Dark Glasses R Us, all clearly
oblivious to the raincloudy sky, pictured the moment afore gannin doon te the
booza. The blerk – sorry, bloke – far left is standing on a box, the one far right down a hole.
Copyright
unknown
Figure
47.4: I remember a crescent in Venice ...
Copyright
© 1993 Paul Spradbery
Copyright
© 2012 Paul Spradbery
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