Friday Fieldwork

I believe there are few places greater for the observational study of human behaviour than a local Wetherspoons on a Friday night. My friend had left the table to go to the bathroom, and with the sound of our conversation no longer taking up space, I sat, food before me, in quietness. She was gone for some minutes (the toilets in practically every Wetherspoons always take you on some kind of pilgrimage) and so I shoved cheesy chips in my mouth, suddenly realising just how hungry I was, aware it had been quite some hours since I last ate. I tuned in to the soundscapes of my local. My eyes never really focused on a specific table or person, instead my gaze just floated around, occasionally falling back on to my plate.

A large group of men, their ages ranging vastly between old and young, sat on a long table behind us. In the absence of our conversation, their roaring back-and-fourths seemed even louder, and I listened as their thick Irish accents made sentences sound almost singsong-like. A particular loud and brutish one kept entertaining the table with stories of men he fought who perpetually “fell like a ton of bricks” once he was done with them. I looked over at the couple sitting diagonally from our table, a man with chipped painted nails and hair to his shoulders sitting opposite a woman who had a pixie cut in the colour between the darkest of blonde and the lightest of brown. He resembled a vampire I thought. When my friend came back, I tapped her arm and simply whispered ‘Nosferatu’, gesturing behind her. She turned around, expecting a hot, Edward Cullen lookalike at the suggestion of someone resembling a vampire and was left thoroughly disappointed.

To the left of us, sitting alone in a large, rounded booth was an elderly man with a laptop and a long-corded antique mouse plugged in. It had been years since I’d seen a mouse like that. Having a Dad entrenched in the pursuits of IT meant there were always various wired mouses lying around his house growing up. There was a vintage charm to it that made me smile. I thought it was quite cool to sit in a busy pub on a Friday night ‘scrolling the web’ completely unencumbered. Occasionally I would look over at his laptop screen that was facing me, he mostly was reading through emails.

Other old men sat in pairs catching up over pints of Guinness or large gin balloons. There were groups of younger people also, most who looked like they came straight from work to socialise and didn’t want to put a cap on the night just yet. I know that was the case from me and my friend, both of us in our work clothes, enjoying a night of spontaneity.

Upon meeting my friend earlier in the evening, I gave her a hug and we told each other we missed the other, before she jokingly inserted that we had got dinner together only four days prior. We walked down the high street, arms linked mostly to combat the cold and to steal each other’s warmth (at least that’s almost always why I initiate physical touch when I am out with friends). We convinced each other to get double spiced rum mixers—it was a Friday night after all—and divulged in salacious stories, giggling like schoolgirls. She was talking to a new guy and was filling me in on their happenings so far. Newly single and free from a debilitating, years-spanning relationship which left her isolated and unable to be the social butterfly she intrinsically is, I felt warmed by the sense that I had my friend back, and that more importantly, she was coming back to herself. Hours passed like minutes, as they always do in each other’s company.

We went back and forth on whether it was excessively greedy to order dessert despite already being full once we finished our mains. We asked when the kitchen closed and decided we’d wait out the feelings of fullness, space must always be made for dessert. She told me her ex-boyfriend made her feel embarrassed about her middle class tendencies, later we laughed at her use of the word ‘upholstery’. In the natural pauses of our conversation, I would look at the other patrons, mouths chomping, lips slippery with various beverages, cheeks red from laughter, but mostly beer.

I’d look on at the older men sitting alone, jackets on and buttoned up, hats glued to their heads. I thought of my Grandad, who I’d usually meet in a Wetherspoons, despite the fact that he didn’t drink. I was reminded of the last time I saw him before he was ill in hospital, when my Mum and I had gone to a Wetherspoons all the way in Wallington near where his wife lived. I thought about him in his prized hat you’d rarely see him without. Memories of him making me laugh occupied my mind. I felt a sadness come over me at the realisation that I’d never sit and have a catch up with him in a Wetherspoons again. Though I’d never come to this particular one with him, they all share the same kind of décor that was enough to invoke feelings of sentimentality. I tried not to get too weary.

We took the remainder of our drinks in to-go cups, diligently wrapped up in our winter uniform (scarves AND gloves), and began walking to the bus stop home, stomachs full of the sugary dessert unnecessarily ordered. We walked past two guys who we had passed at the start of our night. Fate, we insisted! “I kind of want to tell him how hard his fit is” I said to my friend, only partly in jest. It was a great outfit for sure. My friend told me he looked like this conservative commentator, and upon googling, he looked exactly like him. That squashed my desire to strike up a conversation, as if the fact that he looked like him meant he also held his political beliefs. He ate chicken wings from the box and spudded a man standing alone at the bus stop. My friend and I watched and giggled.

So far, January has proven itself to be kind. I’m back at the gym (cliché) and my yearly vision board is complete and set as the lockscreen of my laptop. I tried out padel (tennis but with a smaller court and weird rackets) with a group of friends in Battersea and the lower half of my body felt it for days after. Pain from physical exercise is always weirdly marked with feelings of triumph. We gulped down matcha drinks with impatience after. I went to see Mousetrap with my Dad after work on Wednesday, indulging in donuts from Donutelier in the intermission, and then hurrying back realising our 20 minutes had gone and went. The play was great fun and quintessentially British. We sat next to an elderly Canadian couple who told us they had just travelled from Edinburgh. When he asked where we were visiting from and I replied we were from London, he remarked that he assumed everyone from London had seen the play already.

It’s the time of year when pavements are filled with dumped Christmas trees and the smell of pine perforates the air. I’m often prodded by a small sense of melancholy each time I pass an abandoned tree lying on the pavement, particularly just days after Christmas (the tradition is to leave them up till epiphany eve!). It signifies a loss of December’s whimsical spirit hastily replaced with a dedication to the seriousness of the New Year. The plus side is that I love the smell of pine, and so each time I pass a fallen tree, I tear off some pine needles and smell them in my hand. I have on my bedside table a short stem from a discarded tree I broke off a few days ago which I smell periodically. Feelings of warmth and comfort rush over me each time. There’s just something about pine.

2025 continues its promises of a fresh start and fun times ahead. I think this year we should relish in love. Just a thought.

How is the New Year treating you?