92. The Pub

I've spent quite a lot of time in The Pub, when I come to think about it. It started when I was 15, in the Phoenix & Firkin by Denmark Hill station, with pints of Scrumpy. Fairly quickly we moved on to normal cider, or beer, because we knew that if the Scrumpy itself didn't kill us, the effects of the Scrumpy would.

Aged 17 and 18 I spent most of my time in the Ivanhoe, with three tall young men of my acquaintance. Lots of beer and bullshit. And laughing. Lots of laughing.

At 18 it was really about me and the BF. She was on her 'gap year' which meant she had lots of time to sit in the pub with me. We did lots of talking about boys and laughing and writing notes to our future selves. I'm not sure any of the notes still exist, but mercifully (for me) the friendship still does.

Manchester was all about the pub, really, hence my dismal degree. The BF kept me fed, with Crispy Pancakes and Chicken Kievs (not at the same time) and the rest of the time I was in the pub. I was very bored in Manchester, and miserable, and if it hadn't been for the BF, my lovely friend from Chorley and regular visits home I think I might have gone under. I certainly got pretty fat.

First job was about meeting the BF in The Pub after work for debriefs about just how AWFUL working was. Everybody I knew and was friends with I met at The Pub.

Then I met Herself, who doesn't really do The Pub (far too grown-up and sophisticated) and anyway I was working all hours so there wasn't as much time for The Pub. A few years later I realised I missed it, and reinstated it.

Nowadays, Herself will accompany me to A Pub if we are in The Countryside, and I go to The Pub with my little brother and some of my friends, most notably Mr Farringer, who I meet once a week in The Pub and we chat and he makes me laugh A LOT and I do my best to make him laugh and I look forward to seeing him and having those chats and it wouldn't be the same if it weren't in The Pub.

There is both good and bad in The Pub and the idea of The Pub. My Parent refers to every pub ever built as 'The Rat & Handbag' which still makes me laugh. I wish I could have occasionally gone to The Pub with my Old Man. I have had the best of times and the worst of times in the pub but I have never been sick in one or otherwise disgraced myself. Sometimes I want something more glamorous. Sometimes I can't decide what to drink. But most of the time, of course, I'm in the pub because I'm meeting a friend, and we're going to have a couple of drinks and a chinwag and, really, there's nothing much better than that.