 |
| Day 17 - Dear Dye, Thanks for the tea... |
Every couple of weeks, I have a cup of tea in Dye's Pie and Mash on Munster Road in Fulham. I've been going there for several years. No fuss. There's chat if you want it. Silence if you'd prefer.
Last year, you might remember Raam Thakrar challenged me to send a postcard a day from my mobile phone for 80 days. For one of the cards, I took the photo above of a cup of tea which Dye had served me. I then sent the postcard to Dye, not telling her it was from me.
Immediately after sending it, I felt a bit embarrassed. It was a stretch to imagine Dye and I had established a friendship, one that would be comfortable with the play involved in sending and receiving this daft card.
It took me months to bring up the card with her, to risk rejection of the offer of play. But then I noticed something that suggested Dye had enjoyed receiving the postcard: she'd pinned it to the board behind her counter. A year on, brilliantly, it's still there.
 |
| Another cup of tea |
As to the other cards, for some I'll never know how they were received.
For sure, I know the location of many: my friends have theirs, my grandfather still has his, my parents theirs. They all really enjoyed the extra post.
And the one I sent to myself of a toppled post box on Regent Street is in front of me, on my desk.
 |
| Day 34 - To me |
But what happened to those sent as protests - like that to the Mayor of London on the redevelopment of London's South Bank? In an office somewhere? In landfill?
 |
| Day 26 - Dear Mayor... Less shopping, more skating |
And did my joke on Day 37 (below) go down well with my cat-loving friends? I've still not got round to asking.
 |
| Day 37 : Just in case you ever need Mr Rowntree fixing, I came across this place today... |
Finally, what of those I offered to strangers to create and send?
Did George (banana, below right) ever explain to his mum why he was at Peckham Rye railway station dressed as a banana? (Day 7) I really hope not.
 |
| Day 7: Dear Mum...from George |
Thanks again to Raam for giving me the postcard credits, and for devising the challenge in the first place.
A year on, the cards have become my diary of sorts from the summer of 2013. Or at least the images have. The majority of the cards, of course, are miles away...
(If you're interested, you can see the rest of the cards here. And in the interests of transparency, Raam gave me 100 credits to use Touchnote's postcard service for free last summer. Views above, however, are my very own. Other postcard apps are available.)
