Manning Street Cafe in Kiama is my wife and I’s favourite breakfast spot. As often as we can, on Sunday mornings, we head down and have a relaxing break from the busy week. The cafe is a bare bones, basic cafe, favoured by families, often noisy and busy and opens onto a busy street. Any of these elements would normally disqualify it from my list of place where I would like to eat. However, none of them detract in any way from our enjoyment of it. The food is wonderful, the coffee is consistently excellent, the service is polite and friendly and Robyn, the owner, is extremely friendly and has a great rapport with her “regulars”
Added to these reasons is that the cafe is patronised by a wide spectrum of people, from locals who are often retired members of the community, tourists, especially in the summer, young families with puppy dogs (they have to eat outside!) and “beachies” who are passing through.
And it was this morning that we encountered another of the tapestry of characters who frequent the cafe. Patrick Tofts is the gentleman’s name. When we came in he was sitting at the table next to us, beavering away on a little laptop. He was tall, had white hair and a white, well-kept beard and was wearing shorts and a polo shirt. Just as we sat down I received an SMS from my daughter saying that she had seen a convoy of classic cars heading north on the Hume Highway. I checked on my phone and, sure enough, there was a big show on at Rosehill Racecourse.
As he must have overheard our conversation, Patrick asked us if we were going to the horse races? I replied that it was a bit too far to go and that it was a car show. One thing led to another and it soon became obvious that we had a lot in common. Patrick spoke with a beautiful, cultured English accent and started telling us his connection with things mechanical. He is 77 years old (but looks nothing like it) and hails from East Anglia in GB. We started on planes, and he recounted how he remembered, as a boy, seeing the V1 flying bombs of Adolf Hitler, flying over his house and landing in locations nearby. Too young to remember the Battle of Britain, he recalls vividly the latter years of the war and the rationing and privations that followed the war.
Next we turned to British cars and we noted that the current passion for restoring 1950’s English cars was amusing given that the cars of the era were almost uniformly boring, slow, handled badly and had little in the way of creature comforts. “Except,” said Patrick, “For Jaguars. THEY were wonderful.” No disagreement with that. He then went on to tell us that, after the war, he found employment in an advertising agency one of whose major clients was Jaguar. Soon he found himself photographing Jaguars for advertising catalogues, Press Releases and glossy hand-outs that dealers made available to potential customers. He became close to Sir William Lyons, Jaguar’s owner and also “Lofty” England, the head of Jaguar’s racing department.
He was privy to a lot of “back room” stuff including having access to the area of the factory where Lyons and his “boffins” fiddles with new designs and ideas. He saw the very early prototypes of the “E” Type and also the XJS. Though now retired, he kept all his original drawings and lay-ups for brochures as well as a huge collection of photographs from the era.
I asked him what he was living now and he said that he was in Kiama to house-sit someone’s house but that the deal had fallen through. So he was on the road looking for something else to do. When I asked him where his home was, he said that he didn’t have one and that he had spent the last 4 to 5 years travelling around Australia house-sitting and seeing the sights.
I then asked him what he was doing to put down his memories and all the amazing things that he had done. he replied that he wasn’t really doing anything but that he was conscious of the fact that he should be doing something. In no time I had introduced him to the wonders of WordPress and blogging and gave him a quick tutorial on how he could start recording his life for his benefit and the benefit of others. I stressed that the secret of success in blogging was to provide original content that his original content should be preserved and shared without delay. He seemed genuinely amazed that anybody would be interested in his story but we parted with the assurance from me that people would most DEFINITELY interested.
A chance meeting and another wonderful character added to the others with whom I have been privileged to share a brief moment in my life. I do hope that Patrick follows through and starts writing his own blog. I, for one, will be lining up to read his story.
