After dinner speaker

I never set out to be an after dinner speaker. When I had an invitation to do so at the Anker Rotary club it seemed churlish to refuse. In fact the invitation came at the recommendation of a contact I made while on the local literary festival group. The invitation was to speak about the book on our village history of which I’m co-author and sole agent.

My involvement came about because I researched and “home published” a slim volume for our village Millennium celebrations. We had a “Memory Lane” exhibition for which we had copied and exhibited photographs from bygone times as well as my village history.

Although I have added a little to that history as new information came to my attention it has been increasing put aside and forgotten about. The exception has been occasional talks on village history at our local village school.

I was rather surprised to be approached by Ralph James of Lichfield Press. He had been given a villagers account of his childhood between the wars and sought more material to make into a book. I should say immediately that Lichfield Press is just a name which has little relation to Lichfield as Ralph lives in France. The only connection is that Ralph lived in Lichfield for a long time and he is keen to provide books about the villages around about.

I was able to supply much of the material he needed plus an introduction to another village amateur historian who had written monographs on the village churches, waterworks etc. We rounded off the material by asking a villager to talk about her 60’s childhood.

Arriving at the new hotel at Drayton Manor theme park I found the club assembling for dinner. I immediately tried to assess their ages ( all male ) because I planned in my talk to ask if they knew some of the war time abbreviations noted in the book. At an average of 71 they were rather familiar with them.

After a rather mediocre meal of Cesar salad followed by Pizza with potato wedges and a little club business I was called upon to speak. I had been intensively preparing over the past couple of days and had made extensive notes. There isn’t a lot of humour in our book but my set piece joke aroused smiles rather than laughter.

I had taken along some of our “Memory Lane” photos and I aroused more laughter than from the joke by referring to the person who held them up as “my glamorous assistant”.

During the meal I learned that my former maths teacher is a Rotarian who is now very ill. Apparently one feature of the group is to visit members who are ill and report on their condition as these fortnightly meetings. I was able to send my good wishes.

The person who gave the vote of thanks turned out ( to my surprise ) to be the brother of the lady who had given our 60’s childhood account. I was thankful that my set joke, while involving her as a child, was quite innocuous.

I know there are people who make a living as an after dinner speaker- I’m not one. I am content with my sole experience.

I will pass on the joke which was voted best at the Edinburgh Fringe.

I don’t like the new pound coin, but then I don’t like change.