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p12
People keep saying to me, 'If Stokey's full of nothing but
dogshit, marauding crusties and poncy under-achievers in the deli, why don't you push off
to the likes of South Norwood then ?' Good question. After all, I could get a bundle for
the house.
Well, it's the folks what keeps me so cheerful. And I'm not talking about Church Street's
infamous bellowing loonies, Olympic standard litter louts or glowering drug dealers. After
all if pusher came to shove I'm sure I could find the latter anywhere. It is me mates.
The fact that if said house was razed to the ground overnight there are a dozen doors
within wailing distance I could beat down at 3 am. That the occupants could be not in, too
drunk to answer or up the Dordogne in a camper van only adds to the charm.
Of course, it can be a complete pain to dash to Stokey Food Store for a pint of milk, when
life's a bitch, you look like you've been dug up and 26 people stop to pass the time of
day and enquire about your bunions. But everyone says it, not just me, this is a peculiar
place for friendship. 'Why?', she muses. I suspect for similar reasons this magazine was
started and succeeds when it's hardly full of puffs for local prep schools and pieces on
the best way to marinate an aubergine (But see p9,
Ed.)
For all its ills, and they are manifestly legion, Stokey is a community. There's the
obvious stuff like it's a one horse town, everyone sashays down Main Street, it's full of
hacks a la moi who work a lot from home and the clincher - there's no tube. But no tube
means it's a fag to escape from N16, especially in the evening when tinctures are to be
taken. 'Oh sod it, let's go down The Fox,' you cry and find everyone else has the same
idea. Cue nods, waves and community air-kissing.
Also N16 is full of people who never quite made it to the top of the tree.
They were priced out of the likes of Islington by the driven, ambitious and anally
retentive who view their neighbours with polite caution and always have an eye to the quid
pro quo. Such people don't make a community. But the 'almost a contender's' do. The quirks
which keep them from the throne are the very qualities which make them friends.
We know the parochialism can get you down bigtime. This is definitely not the place to try
to conduct a clandestine affair. But we rattle along together don't we ? Now - back to the
Council...
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