East Finchley is blessed with a number of alleys. Some as small as the few steps between Durham Road and Creighton avenue, though to me a whole chapter begins and lies there. The Walks, which straddle Market place to the Grange, a step down just a few steps away. The alleys linking Cherry Tree and Highgate Woods. 

Those with the darker histories have gone. The pathway that led down to the Station, now lost to MacDonalds, where a man died, and that circled around what used to be the Church hall and All Saints in Durham Road, out of which a gunman stepped to kneecap an informer. All the dark spaces, the secret shortcuts, the gathering places. 

The Graffiti still remains on some, the memories of secret encounters and dark gropings. Are they still used. Have new lights been installed to allow for prurient inspection. Are they empty at night now East Finchley is blessed with a number of alleys. Some as small as the few steps between Durham Road and Creighton avenue, though to me a whole chapter begins and lies there. The Walks, which straddle Market place to the Grange, a step down just a few steps away. The alleys linking Cherry Tree and Highgate Woods. 

Those with the darker histories have gone. The pathway that led down to the Station, now lost to MacDonalds, where a man died, and that circled around what used to be the Church hall and All Saints in Durham Road, out of which a gunman stepped to kneecap an informer. All the dark spaces, the secret shortcuts, the gathering places. 

The Graffiti still remains on some, the memories of secret encounters and dark gropings. Are they still used. Have new lights been installed to allow for prurient inspection. Are they empty at night until the drunks go home at 11.30. Are there no happenings there, do not lovers meet, do children not smoke their first smoke and hide, are they just shortcuts? 

 

 East Finchley © 2000
 
 
 

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