RERUM # 14
We checked out a second pub in Great Offley today, the Red Lion. Itís on the southern edge of the village within the fork of an unmade-up track & the Kingís Walden Road. Itís clearly the localsí pub. Itís absolutely basic with no concessions made to suits up from Hitchin & Luton for business lunches or weekend walkers looking for a bit of unspoiled rural England. Itís not a tied house ñ not owned by any single brewery - & it serves Fullerís & Youngís beers (two major London ales). They also had the Scottish beer Caledonian on draft in the form of Deucharís IPA. I gave it a go but found it smooth & bland. Iíll stick to Fullerís London Pride for future visits ñ of which thereíll be a few with the Red Lion only 5 minutes away from Lawns Close.
We shared the public bar with a quartet of elderly local men. Each had his own demarcated area within the bar, this established over years of patronage. They all spoke with the slight burr that is distinguishable as being all thatís left of the Hertfordshire accent. When the oldest of the group left, one of the others referred to him as Armitage. When later I was browsing through a book of local history, the name was identified as that of one of the oldest families in Offley, their roots going back into the Middle Ages.
This was oddly comforting. So many villages in the south of the country ñ particularly those within 60 ñ 70 miles of London ñ are now little more than domestic boltholes for commuters working in the city. The steady middle class diaspora from urban & suburban areas into the rural fringes of the Home Counties has driven up house prices & there has been - & there continues to be ñ a corresponding migration into the drab & characterless urban fringes of local families who canít afford housing in their native region. Where I used to live ñ a village called Rowledge in Surrey - & where Emmaís parents currently live, Headley, her being the vicar ñ only a handful of original families remain. In their stead, cottages that had accommodated generations of one family now house gentlemen with golf trolleys & ladies with Labradors.
As we wandered back to the house we discussed what it was about Great Offley that seemed to defy this late 20th century trend. We concluded that the presence of council housing* going back 50 years had enabled a continuity of residency for those native to the area. And because (being impoverished teachers rather than fat cat barristers) we had bought a house within a council estate, we were encountering only those whose residency in Great Offley went back at least as far as the building of the houses some 50 years previously.
In the tiny, very pretty parish church of St Mary Magdalene, I came across the local history book mentioned above. A smartly produced little hardback, it was a bargain for £2.00. It comprises almost entirely local photographs from the first half of the 20th century, but the brief introduction provides a fascinating description of the development of the village during that time. The author is a local woman, born between the wars, & her literate & unsentimental (if at times somewhat wistful) account has established firmly for me a social, historical & cultural context for the community of which we are about to become a part.
*Housing erected by municipal authorities & rented out cheaply to local families. In the 1980s Margaret Thatcherís administration passed controversial legislation that gave residents the right to buy the houses that they were renting.
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ëSingingí, states the excellent David Hepworth writing in the excellent monthly music (& much more) magazine Word, ëis the most naked form of musicí. Too right, I thought, &, meme-conscious to an almost neurotic degree at present, I decided to write out a List. Here it is ñ my 10 most naked vocal performances.
11:47:01 PM 
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