Once Upon A Time There Was A Tavern...

Although I've never drank alcohol in my life, I still went into pubs on occasion for a soft drink or a meal, either with friends or by myself.  In my late teens, early adulthood, there was one pub (among several) that me and various pals would visit now and again as it had a nice 'homey' ambience and, if memory serves, a real log fire against the back wall.  (It definitely had a fire which I think was real, but may have been an electric or gas one with log or coal fire effect.)  The pub had once been a farmhouse I believe, and though it'd likely had its interiors completely remodelled, it managed to capture (in my mind anyway) that old-fashioned feel of a coach house-type inn from a long-vanished era.

Anyway, last year sometime, I was making my way home after visiting someone and, as my route led past this very same pub, I decided to pop in for a glass of cola and a bag of crisps or nuts.  (Perhaps even a bag of crisps and a bag of nuts, simply because I'm a greedy boy who knows how to live!  Hell, maybe I'd even have two glasses of cola.)  Imagine my disappointment to find it'd had a refit, with one side sectioned off to serve as a snooker or pool area, and no welcoming fire in sight.  I'd been hoping to revisit an aspect of my past and rekindle memories of earlier times when I was a young man with what was surely going to be a glorious future ahead of me.

'Twas not to be, alas; it no longer held any hint of the familiar about it and could've been any pub anywhere in the country, with no ghosts of yesteryear to sit among for half an hour or so in pleasant dreams of reverie.  So, something else that'd been changed almost beyond recognition when I wasn't looking and my life seems diminished by it.  One of the worst aspects of aging is not just the loss of one's youth, but also the loss of many tangible 'signposts' of that youth, whatever they may be.  Not to mention one's vitality and enthusiasm to meet each new day - along with the illusion of a never-ending succession of new days stretching into infinity and beyond.  (Now where have I heard that before?)

If you're getting on in years, what things do you miss from your youth (if anything), and if you could be granted three wishes, would you turn back the clock to an earlier time in your life or would you waste them in wishing for wine, women, and song (and loads of dosh)?  Tell all in the comments section.   

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