Come on in, snoop all you like
Lo and behold an aimless substack for me to ramble and rant about the life and times of Phoebe Hennell. Frivolous meandering. A public diary. Bienvenue !
“You either are, or you’re not”, says a shabby primitivist painter waving a rollie in my face. I’d wound up in one of those supposed last remnants of seedy old Soho for the birthday of a ninety year old diva: a basement called the Colony Room Green.
“You’re studying journalism, but do you write? How do you think punk started?!”
I fumble about and say how, aside from my coursework, I keep a messy diary to (pinching from universal godmother Didion) remember what it was to be the girl in the pink flowery hat, lest lose your past hatted selves to the ether and blah blah. My ex-husband and I co-wrote a cathartic play script as French practice and made headway with a joint memoir (for our eyes only). But do I show anyone my jottings? Hell no.
“When you wake up tomorrow morning, spend ten minutes writing about this place”, the dude instructs me. “What will you remember?”.
The Colony is less louche now that its regulars are in their twilight years (regrettably so – I cannot deny my penchant for seedy spots), unlike back when it was frequented by haute bohemians like Francis Bacon and Lucian Freud.
But it hasn’t yet slid into that mournful phase where historic hangouts become like haunted museums or tacky tourist attractions. It’s retained its “come on in, unless you’re a bore” spirit, and can still be seen in full swing with all sorts of personalities dancing around the piano.
My night’s highlight? Meeting a funny showbiz guy in a glittery turban who claims to have interviewed Bowie, and who apparently hoards stacks of magazines in his office towering up to the ceiling. I introduced myself because he reminded me of a wizard-like local character often sighted around Oxford.
The well meaning rollie-shaking man wasn’t brutal like Bukowski’s poem So You Want To Be a Writer (“if it doesn't come bursting out of you in spite of everything, don't do it”), but the sentiment was the same. My diary is patchy with cartoon sketches and musings cut off after five sentences, my personal essays stay private, and well known is the ordeal of landing your freelance pitch in print.
He made me realise what I already knew: I need to get a bloody move on, exercise my writing muscle, and let my friends into my thoughts and adventures.
So here we are!!!!! Lo and behold an aimless, insignificant substack for me to ramble and rant about the life and times of Phoebe (and possibly to dump articles that got rejected by actual publications). Silly meandering life-writing. A public diary.
If you’re reading this, you’re likely an acquaintance who, like me, is inexplicably curious about the inner world of select people you met once at a party — people you’re secretly a fan of and have a sort of parasocial relationship. And then there are the contrarian political substacks of acquaintances I follow simply because they’re so ridiculous (I hopefully won’t be one of those).
What I adore about those parasocial substacks is that they leave a window on the latch on the first floor of their house. We spectres can float in, flick through their diary left wide open, brush their hair at the dressing table, then float back out into the sky without leaving a trace.
So come on in for a tipple, you’re most welcome to snoop :)