Yeah, these are just the rules and regulations

A little known subsection of the unwritten British constitution concerns rules specific to Lewes. These are rarely discussed and remain largely untested. I’m only going to commit them to paper, or whatever this webby thing equivalent is made of, because last weekend I discovered there are two more than I realised. The standard rules, which we all know, are:

(1) We won’t be druv.

(2) Druv is an elusive concept, but essentially means our right to object if anyone does anything we don’t like.

(3) We have to not be druv a lot, because despite living in one of the most prosperous areas of one of the richest countries on earth, rotters are always trying to push us around with regard to our beer and whatnot.

(4) Talking of beer, Harveys is the best in the world. End of.

(5) There is no fence-sitting here. Lewes will not tolerate wishy-washy middle-grounders. You’re either Waitrose or Tescos. You’re either a Tory who votes Tory, or a Labourite who votes Liberal. You either hate DFLs, or you are a DFL. You either think the parking scheme is the greatest example of man’s inhumanity to man, or you say things like, ‘But I can always get into the Needlemakers car-park now and anyway you only get a ticket if you break the rules.’

(6) Bonfire Clause 1. If you’re not for it, you’re against it. Vaguely non-committal is not an option. Anyone who says, ‘Fireworks are pretty aren’t they? Mind you, seen one parade and you’ve seen them all,’ will be drummed out of town.

(7) Bonfire Clause 2. You are not allowed to say anything critical about Bonfire Societies. Unless you’re a member of a Society having a pop at another Society; this is an essential element of Bonfire experience.

(8) No useful shops are allowed to move in. They must all go to Uckfield.

Two weeks ago I went to the Southover Priory May fair thing and found I was falling in line with the hitherto unknown but clearly well-established rule number 9:

(9) Everyone who is within a ten mile radius must attend the May Fair.

Every woman and her husband was there. It was marvellous. I said, ‘hello,’ so many times I ran out and had to substitute the less satisfactory, ‘wotcha’ instead. Thing One was in her element, shooting plastic crossbow arrows, making plastic soldiers out of a mould, and interrogating me as to why there was so much plastic around in the Middle Ages. Thing Two was only interested in climbing teetering piles of Priory rubble, which have stood unmoving since time immemorial but began looking a bit crumbly after he’d happened to them.

Then the drumming started.

(10) There is often drumming at Lewes events. Do not ask why. You will like it. Or if you don’t, get you gone quietly, perhaps to a comfortable hostelry.

You will be pleased to hear that we rule-abiding Lewesians followed this one to the letter.


Beth Miller 18th May 2011. Published in VivaLewes.com and Viva Lewes handbook, May 2012

Can't get used to losing you no matter what I try to do

I don’t know what it is about me and Bonfire, but the phrase which springs to mind concerns my inability to arrange a jolly good session in Harvey’s brewery. Every year I am fully armed with all the programmes; yet every year I’m on Grange Road when the procession’s on Southover, or hanging about at Boots when everyone else is at the War Memorial. I feel the heat of the flames, but by the time I arrive, there’s nothing left but a smouldering torch in the gutter.

On the plus side, I’ve never taken a rookie in the face, and I do get an awfully good view. Of boarded up shop-fronts, admittedly.

This year, I hoped it would be different. We mustered promptly outside the Kings Head, and to the sound of the band and the lights of cars coming straight at us, we followed the Southover procession up Priory Street.

‘Going at quite a clip, aren’t they?’ puffed Grangey, as we broke into a run to try and keep up. It was like the London Marathon. When Thing One objected to being yanked along between us, her feet off the ground, we slowed down and watched the parade disappear round the corner.

On the way into town we got distracted by the guy selling light-up toys – at least this year we got the laser home before it broke, so it was well worth FOUR QUID - and could find no sign of Southover when we reached the Cliffe. Then we heard, far away, a series of splashes indicating they’d thrown the crosses in the Ouse without us. We looked unsuccessfully for another Society to chase, then milled aimlessly about, following groups of people at random. In this manner we were swept against our will, first into the Volunteer, then into a group of Japanese teenagers chucking rookies, and finally into someone’s house when they popped home to get another sweater.

Then a woman said confidently, ‘Down the Cliffe now’, and we turned to see a DFL-FB family, in matching Barbours. We followed closely. ‘Jonty reckoned this would be the best place’, she said, stationing her group outside Spectrum Opticians. ‘Five minutes till the next procession’.

She handed out sparklers, snacks and drinks to her brood. When the littlest child asked for the toilet, he was told, ‘Pop across the road to number 10, Gilly said it would be fine.’ Thing One watched in awe, clearly planning to swap mothers immediately.

Exactly as the woman had predicted, the parade went past. We got to see everything, for the first time ever. In the ensuing silence, we turned to our guru to see what we were going to do next.

‘Hot chocolate at number 17’, she said, consulting her list, ‘before relocating for the next procession.’

Off they went, to their lovely pit-stop, and then it was just us, standing in the cold.

‘Might as well go home’, said Grangey, ‘We’ll never find the damn thing by ourselves.’


Beth Miller, 10th November 2009. Published in VivaLewes.com. Photo by Carly Moorman

Tell 'em a hookah smoking caterpillar has given you the call

One hot day a couple of weeks ago, Born and Bred Boy was lounging in the Gardeners Arms appraising the Racing Post when he began to feel sleepy. All of a sudden, a white rabbit boinged past, staring intently at an iPhone and muttering, ‘I’m late for the 16.51’, as it dashed out the door.

Intrigued, Boy gave chase, and they both tumbled down a huge hole in the Cliffe roadworks. When Boy straightened himself out, he was astonished to find himself in London, on the Finchley Road. There was no sign of the rabbit. A strange fellow, who was perched on a bollard smoking a dodgy-looking pipe, said abruptly, ‘Who are YOU?’

When Boy politely replied, ‘I hardly know sir, just at present’, the man called out, ‘Good lord everyone, it’s another wretched UFL’.

A crowd of strangers thronged round poor Boy, who only managed to say, ‘Unidentified Flying what?’, before a florid matron holding a pig-like baby tutted scornfully, ‘Typical. They always have too much to say, these Lewes people.’

‘Too right’, added a ginger-haired man with a huge grin, who faded in and out of view. ‘What makes them think they can move up here and start complaining about our Primarks and our Tesco Metros?’

‘Before you can say no to a planning application, they’re letting off rookies and insisting they won’t be druv, whatever that is’, said an old man with a white beard, unaccountably doing a handstand.

‘But’, said Boy indignantly, ‘Just because people come from the same town doesn’t mean their views are identical.’

‘Have a nibble of this, mate’, said the pipe-smoking guy, rummaging in his bag. ‘See if it don’t make you feel better.’

Feeling discombobulated, Boy ate some of the mushrooms the guy handed him. At once, the scene dissolved and he was sat at a table in a pub, a bit like the Gardeners except women were allowed. A toff in a top hat immediately cried, ‘There’s no room!’

As Boy began to protest that there was in fact, plenty of room, a girl wearing bunny ears said lazily, ‘No room for any more Lewesians with your cerr-azy striped jumpers and your misguided persecution complexes.’ Her head then fell forward into a teapot.

To steady his nerves, Boy took a sip of an unspecified brown liquid which tasted rather like Harvey’s Best. Instantly he shrank to the size of a dormouse, at which point everyone in the pub started throwing darts at each other. Terrified, Boy cowered under the table, the noise of darts hammering against the wood like a machine gun, and wished he was back home.

When he opened his eyes he was back to his usual size and sitting in the real Gardeners, pint and paper where he’d left them, but there was still a persistent thudding noise. He went outside, and found the street filled with dozens of people dancing wildly, nails fitted to the soles of their boots.

Thank goodness – back to sanity.


Beth Miller, 14th July 2009. Picture by Suzie Fox. Published in VivaLewes.com and in Viva Lewes magazine, August 2009.