Many writers have shared their thoughts with the public:

"There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they'll take you." - Beatrix Potter

"The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say." - Anaïs Nin

"Sharing your writing, being enlarged by others' writing, is what makes you feel famous." - Gretchen Bernabei

"Writing is not an amusing occupation. It is a combination of ditch-digging, mountain-climbing, treadmill and childbirth." - Edna Ferber

"Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing." - Ben Franklin

"One must be drenched in words, literally soaked in them, to have the right ones to form themselves into the proper pattern at the right moment." - Hart Crane

"There are three rules for writing. Unfortunately, no one can agree what they are." - W. Somerset Maugham

The Dog of the South

Like the middle aisle at Aldinga Aldi, we of the Top are a motley gaggle, mostly reduced. Cheap and strange we might seem to the casual browser, but we’re no giveaways. Recessions, depressions, and the odd pandemic all narrowed hours of opening, but never diverted us from the mission at hand.

Course, your witness wasn’t yet a twinkle for the great earthquake of fifty-four that cracked church walls like Violet Crumble and sent folks fleeing up and down our town hill in search of the shelter of a bar stool in front of an imperial pint of stout. But I do find myself in the public bar that dark day, the day word breaks of the biggest threat to drinkers since doors swung open in the nineteenth century. The day that finds Red-Nosed Ronnie slithering from table to table, wearing his horror mask of bonhomie. The one he normally stashes behind the bar for such as Anzac Day, federal elections, and other solemn occasions.

Like so many epoch-shaking moments, it all starts as plain as one of Occasional Alice’s fruitless scones.

- Organising a competition, gents. Cash prize.

Julie-Anne ignores him, not so much because he’s called her a male, for, like, the gazillionth time, or because she’s focused on the greyhound ambling across the big screen in something not resembling a hurry. More that disdaining Ronnie is a tough habit to break.

Always alert to the acquisition of something approaching nothing, Bar Fly Billy takes the bait.

- Kind of cash prize we talking here?

- One hundred big ones.

- Count me in.

- Wise man.

A dead giveaway, unless your definition of wise stretches as wide as the Territory border. Furthermore, Ronnie omits his usual schtick about how winning would reduce Billy’s tab owing to around a working man’s weeks wages. I take this to be a bad sign.

Second bad sign is what passes for a smile on Ronnie’s fresh-air free face.

- Thing is, we’re looking for a new name for the pub.

- What’s wrong with the Top?

Billy leaves me little choice but to intervene.

- Ain’t called the Top, least, not officially. Place you’re standing is The Four Winds Bar.

- Says who?

Like Julie-Anne, my eyes are still fixed on the two-oh-five New South time from Dapto.

- Says the sign out there.

Which is Ronnie’s cue.

- Kills me to say it, but he’s absolutely right. This place is officially the Four Winds Bar.

At least for now.

Hearing another bad sign, I unleash my brain from canine matters.

- Right you are. No need to change the name then. Already been done. Top pub it is.

Ronnie smiles like I’ve just shat in his pants, with him still in them.

- Yeah, nah, that’s very clever. Too clever. Fact is, we’re looking to rename this place in line with the new branding.

- Always seen you as your own man, Ronnie.

- Course I’m my own man.

- Then who, pray, is We?

There’s a moment of hesitation, we all catch it, just as Unbeatable Warrior trots across the line dead last at Dapto.

- The new owners. Lovely fellas. From up the Athens of the South.

Now, there’s so much wrong with this answer, it’s hard to know just where to make the first incision. Beggars can’t be surgeons, so, I stick in the first knife I have to hand.

- Don’t tell me you’re selling us out to folks from the city.

The heel of my Coopers thumps onto the table, to emphasise my shock. Fact is, sellout rumours have been flying around for weeks, months, as long as anyone can remember. It’s even-money folk talked of little else as they legged it to the Top pub in fifty-four, buildings crumbling right and left.

- These blokes have the money to shake this place up. Just what this place needs, I reckon.

Billy goes for another chew on the bait.

- Place could do with a lick of paint.

- Paint, nothing. We’re talking proper furniture. Better menu. Families.

It’s the last word turns every head towards Ronnie. The very last person a proper drinker wants to come across in their pub, other than a copper, is someone related to them.

Attention won, Ronnie drops his voice to press home his advantage.

- That’s where regulars like yourselves come in. This here is your chance to be part of history. Come up with a new name for the pub. Brand new title to stand outside that window. Something that suits our new direction. Cash prize, too. A hundred smackers and you see your name in lights. My parting gift to you for your years of faithful pissing it up in this knackered old shed. Don’t even have to pay to enter. That sound like a great deal, or what?

Ronnie looks at Billy who looks at me who looks at Julie-Anne who looks at Occasional Alice who doesn’t look at anyone, as per.

- I got a name.

So rare is it that Alice speaks, her voice commands attention out of all proportion to its content. As if an angel has spoken, or a barmat, or the stuffed marlin on the wall.

Red-Faced Ronnie is the first to react.

- Well, keep it to yourself for now, Alice. Voting closes in one week, when I’ll announce the new name and the lucky winner of a hundred bucks. One of the girls’ll pass you an official ballot paper. You got one free with every four drinks.

The spirited discussion of what exactly constitutes free in the great state of South Australia takes up much of the next two hours, which is enough commerce to secure ballot papers for the four of us. As well as a consensus around Alice’s suggested name.

Surprisingly for a man whose reason for living is closely aligned to his stated opinions, Bar Fly Billy is the only one uneasy with Alice’s inspired suggestion.

- Pubby McPubface sounds a bit simple, like. And Ronnie’s never going to go for that. No offence Alice, but as a name for a serious pub, it is a bit shithouse.

Checking Billy’s face for signs of irony, I put him straight.

- That, my friend, is precisely why young Alice’s suggestion is a stroke of genius.

- Also, it rings a bell. Pretty sure I’ve heard something similar somewhere.

Julie-Anne engages her bored voice.

- Poms came up with a similar suggestion in a naming ballot concerning a boat. Boaty McBoatface.

- But why would anyone want to drink in a pub with such a daggy name?

Julie-Anne looks at me who looks at Alice who looks at nothing. As per, it’s left to me to explain everything, in full detail.

- My guess would be no-one, or perhaps less.

When Julie-Anne can tolerate Billy’s confused face no more, she fills in the blanks that have appeared right across his cranium.

- That fucker Ronnie is trying to sell this place from under us. Pulled the same stunt ten years ago.

Even the stickler, Alice chimes in.

- And eight years ago. And five.

- We convince enough people to vote for this name, we’ll bring the whole thing to a halt.

Billy is still confused.

- But you hate old red face.

Julie-Anne tips her head with weary agreement.

- So, wouldn’t new management and a lick of paint be a good thing?

Reluctantly, she explains.

- Ronnie is a joyless, money-grabbing arse. But selling would mean change. The one thing we fear. Everyone does, especially those who pretend they don’t. You could say it’s one of the few things that unite our race as a whole. Change, and hating Collingwood. Consequently, change is to be avoided at all costs.

Having enjoyed banging my pint down earlier, I reprise the action and bring the discussion to an end.

- It is indeed. Now. Whose round is it?

The next few days are an exercise in democracy would warm the hearts of constitutional scholars, senators, and what have you. Bar Fly Billy is our man on the ground spreading the word round the other stalwarts of the Top, from the bowls club corner to the rural firie cabal. Julie-Anne covers the part-timers in the butchers and coffee shops, while I targets the middle and bottom regulars who make it as far as the Top only when they need to serve out temporary life bans from the Bottom and Middle.

Unconvinced her silent style will be an asset on the stump, we leave Alice to her own devices, where she is at her most Alicest. By the time the week is up, I reckon we’ve covered about every household in town with a stake in the preservation of local history and a place to drink and talk shit in peace.

Friday night rocks up, as it so often does. The Who’s Who and Who’s Not assemble before Happy Hour for the big announcement. Expectation is up there with Melbourne Cup day, with folks as far as Mount Compass come to witness Red-Face Ronnie make the call that will change history, not to mention geography.

Which, being him, he refuses to do.

- Can’t fucking read that out.

- It’s called democracy, Ron.

He looks me dead in the face, like this whole renaming saga is my fault rather than his.

- Can’t call a pub that.

- People have spoken.

The large Pommy bloke who runs the firies belts his support.

- He’s right. Read it out.

- This here is the most stupid name I’ve ever heard.

- What is?

- Pubby McPubface.

As the loudest cheer since Port made their last grand final goes up, Ronnie’s face edges in the direction of purple. He knows he’s been done, he knows what he promised, and still he’s surprised, nay, amazed.

It’s remarkable how little some folks learn.

- This is a bloody stitch up.

- Whatever it is, Pubby McPubface is the new name for this pub. And I believe you owe Alice here one hundred big ones.

- Hundred bucks, my arse. This poll is null and void. I’d sooner shut this place down than call it that.

- Not your problem any more, Ron. Said yourself, place is already sold.

- Said the sale is going through. Nothing in stone. Just waiting for confirmation of the name.

- Then you’d best call the new owners to tell them the good news.

- This is typical of you. Your bloody cronies. And every last damn one of you in this hellhole.

I let the moment linger, just so everyone’s eyes and ears are fully focused on what comes next.

- Only one way I see round this. Julie-Anne?

- Way I see it, if the people want Pubby McPubface but you won’t accept a free and fair democratic decision, then we need to turn to the runner up.

Nodding like a cheap dashboard puppy, I turn back to face the accused.

- You OK with that, Ron?

Every single person in the Top now looks at Ron, who takes the time to stare right back at every single one. Which takes longer than it ought to. Though to be fair, at least old red face knows when he’s been done like a kipper.

- What’s in second place?

- Hold your horses there. First, we all need to know the key thing here. Will you accept the democratic choice this time around, and put it to the new owners, whether you like it or not?

Thing is, if this was just me and Ron, or even me, Ron and Julie-Anne, I know exactly how he would respond. But, me, Julie-Anne and every drinker in town is a hard constituency to stare down forever, particularly those who are big, run the firies and are rumoured to have served a stint in the SAS.

- All right. Read it out.

Julie-Anne picks from the only other pile that isn’t a single entry, and turns over the slip of paper.

- I name this pub, The Dog of the South.

As the second cheer goes up, Ron makes his way back behind the bar. Julie-Anne sidles up and stands me a rare drink, much to the dismay of Bar Fly Billy.

- They’re never going to go for it, you know.

- As a matter of fact, that’s what I’m banking on.

- You do realise, this place will still be a shithole.

- We wouldn’t have it any other way. By the way, I had no idea you were a fan of Charles Portis. Or any other author, for that matter.

On the grounds of decorum, I don’t share with Julie-Anne my surprise that she has in fact ever read a book.

- Don’t follow you.

- The Dog of the South. It’s one of his. Also wrote True Grit. Fine yarnster all round.

- Wasn’t nothing to do with no book. Just love greyhounds, is all.

Now Julie-Anne is few things, and one of the many things she isn’t, is a liar. Following her eyes to the big screen at the four fifty-five from Angle Park, I’m set to thinking how close we all came to catastrophe, and how the strangest of events can sway your life one way or another, when you think you know something, but in fact you don’t know grit from shit.

And then I’m thinking, just as Happy Sandboy misses out in a photo, how The Top is safe for another year. I’m so happy, I serious consider standing an extra round for Julie-Anne, Billy, and maybe even Ronnie himself.

Or maybe not.