Dear Sir,

Looking at your newspaper online , as I do here in Byron Bay, New South Wales twice a week usually, I noticed the item on the reopening of The Spot under new management.

While I certainly wish the new owner and team well in their business venture, I can't help but reflect upon what a wonderful part of Bermudian life the old Spot was during my sojourn in Bermuda in the Seventies; and later, when on subsequent visits I was able to taste its delights once again. To sit at the counter and eat its “down home” cooking, shoot the breeze with Ted Powell and the friendly staff, some of whom, like "Toots", Cleo, Gay [the erstwhile chef] and several others became almost legends in their own right. I shan't try to define its special appeal; but it certainly possessed it!

I often said that if I wanted to feel the pulse, the heartbeat of Bermuda — certainly the older Bermuda — I would sense it there in that friendly establishment.

A while ago, this journal published an old Spot menu from the Seventies. It was amusing, informative and even a little shocking to see the prices of that era relative to now. But such is Time. And as an old Carolina woman surnamed Ball, which is also an island name, said in a radio programme I listened to years ago, observed: “Time bring on changes”. It does indeed. And sometimes for the better, too.

I hope that Bermudian locals and visitors alike may continue to enjoy the atmosphere and service in the reopened establishment. Meanwhile, I shall always reflect that one definition of happiness in my life was the chance to revisit the Spot and enjoy the whole experience: that pie and ice cream and coffee. “Heaven, I’m in heaven,” as the old Irving Berlin song has it in Cheek to Cheek.

I wish Bermuda well and my thoughts are with you during the exigencies of the Covid pandemic.

DAVID MORRIS

(Former Purvis Primary School staff)

Byron Bay, New South Wales

Australia