More Tooting

[When resting from his stage and studio duties, Colum divided his time between a security guard company for whom he helped mind buildings, and certain south London solicitors, specialising in criminal work, for whom he did outdoor clerking, which he rather liked. You got to meet all kinds of interesting people and to see all kinds of interesting stuff. I cannot now remember the names of any of his employers, but I doubt whether the one snapped above was one of them. He did not like to work standing up and I don't recall a uniform anything like these, although I do remember a hat]

[Himself in his younger days, perhaps not so long after he launched himself onto luvvie land - without, he used to tell me, much help from his alma mater, RADA. More a matter of DIY. Culled from Shutterstock by a correspondent, using wheezes unknown to me]

Following Colum's death noticed at reference 1 earlier in the year and the subsequent warm-up visit, noticed at reference 2, we recently attended the modest wake which had been organised in the Long Room Hotel Bar, sometime the Mitre, sometime terminus for those 77 buses which did not fancy going the extra mile to Tooting railway station, not to be confused with Tooting Broadway tube station, let alone Tooting Bec tube station.

A cold day, an even colder end of afternoon, so we dressed up. In my case, including woollen cardigan, tweedy jacket (ex charity shop, but made in Hong Kong, mostly of herringboned wool, for the brand called Banana Republic), duffel coat, woolly scarf (ex the famous Hook Road car booter) and gloves. This did not stop plenty of young people parading with plenty of naked flesh on view. Wonderful thing, a young person's circulation. From where I associated to a caravan on the Hull dock side one winter's evening, doing a roaring trade supplying whopper burgers to fuel up the scantily dressed young ladies doing the night life which was presumably somewhere around. Perhaps they were doing something called warehouse?

Something going on on the lines, so we could not get past Wimbledon on the way to Waterloo, with changing onto a bus at Earlsfield normally being the best way, so we changed at Balham on the Victoria side. A plus being that I was able to show off to BH that important bit of heritage, the self-winding platform clocks from New York.

Next stop was a stroll through Tooting Market where it looked as if the old-style indoor market stalls, a lot of them selling food and fabrics you might have trouble getting in Epsom, were gradually getting pushed out by cocktail bars and restaurants. All very chic, and I dare some some of them were expensive. All part of the gentrification of the area. From where I associated to the not so far off days when Clapham North was a bit of a dump - and where I dare say a decent sized terraced house now costs more than a suburban villa in Epsom. At least that is what I think it says on the deeds. 

But not so much of a dump that there was not a specialised beer joint where Colum once celebrated something or other, perhaps a birthday. Beerodrome or some such name.

Pushed on down Mitcham Road, inspected the fish shop, passed on the heritage bingo hall, to be pulled up by what was clearly a lovingly maintained classic car. The owner, possibly the owner of one of the shops behind the camera, was all too happy to tell me all about it. I was invited to get in, but I worried about getting out again. A bit of talk about the expense and difficulty of getting spares for a 60 year old car over from the US. A car which was just one of a number of such in his collection. Perhaps he was a member of a classic car syndicate.

I thought he said Ford Mustang, but not being very sure I asked Bing this morning, but no suitable pictures there. But Google Image Search turned the clinching off-rear view included above, with matching buffers, rear lights and central badge. Not identical but near enough. For more, see reference 3.

Next stop, to take a look at the flat Colum occupied for maybe thirty years. Desirable downstairs flat still empty a year after the event, this despite all we are told about the shortage of affordable housing - with this bit of affordable housing being looked after by the Tooting Housing Cooperative. The front garden, once looked after by the lady in the upstairs flat, whom we were told was still there, more or less demolished. So not at all clear what was going on, and none of those who turned out to the Long Room could add anything - apart from observing that co-ops were apt to be run by a nest of more or less amateur committees which could take a long time to get anything done. Which might be quite unfair in this case: there might be some very real difficulty to be dealt with.

And so onto the Long Room, where we took a large table in a function room off the main bar. In which last there was quite a lot of custom, quite a lot of television and some quite fancy looking food. Not a bad looking place at all, provided you could find proper seats - that is to say not high chairs - out of the way of all the screens, as we had.

Colum was then duly waked. Which involving the bubbling up of all kinds of memories, interesting, curious and otherwise. Most of us had known him for many years, some for very many years.

PS: looking at the first snap again, this Monday morning, I wonder whether the police fret about security companies sailing too close to their wind with their liveries, with those of both people and vehicles rather aping their own. One might easily get confused in the heat of the moment, and I dare say one can build scenarios where this might have unfortunate results. Without having given much thought to the matter, I for one would like plenty of clear space between them, so that there is little danger of said confusion.

References

References 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/06/in-memoriam.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/11/a-visit-to-tooting.html.

Reference 3: https://lookatthecar.org/ford-mustang-1960/.