There’ll Always be an England

England’s loss to Germany in the World Cup devastated by Brit friends. They knew their team was going nowhere, but the referee’s blown call on Lampard’s goal was an insult to the national identity. After this was the country that invented football and a foreigner has to ask, “Will there always be an England.”

This rephrasing of RULE BRITANNIA’s “Britons never, never, never shall be slaves” come from the popular 1940 song by Vera Lynn and even with the collapse of the British Empire, England seemed eternal, although my drinking friends in Pattaya are constantly bemoaning the present state of the island nation.

“England ain’t what is was.” Richard claims, ignoring that he’s half-Polish.

My introduction to England was in 1978. London. I was cohabitating with a blonde fashion model next to the Chelsea football pitch on Fulham Road. Quiet except for football days. Everyone was English then. Proud of the puttering cars, Stalinist wages, polluted skies, and double-decker buses. I felt like it had always been 1984 in the UK and nothing was ever going to change that Sphinctered Isle.

“And England’s dreaming.”

However the construction worker from Luton has a point.

England ain’t what it used to be.

The mad London bombers came from his hometown. Chicken curry has outpaced fish and chips as the #1 English meal and even more pointedly by year’s end Mohammad will be the most popular name for newborns in the UK.

Mohammad beating out Jack?

Whatever happened to Percy?

Maybe it all went to shit when Tiny Tim sang THERE’LL ALWAYS BE AN ENGLAND at the Isles of Wight in 1970, then again integration is the ultimate price of imperialism. You go, conquer, leave, and bring a little bit back with you.

Not just the curries.

Of course there’ll always be one place that’s always England and that’s the Falklands.

THERE’LL ALWAYS BE AN ENGLAND

I give you a toast, ladies and gentlemen.
I give you a toast, ladies and gentlemen.
May this fair dear land we love so well
In dignity and freedom dwell.
Though worlds may change and go awry
While there is still one voice to cry – - –

There’ll always be an England
While there’s a country lane,
Wherever there’s a cottage small
Beside a field of grain.
There’ll always be an England
While there’s a busy street,
Wherever there’s a turning wheel,
A million marching feet.

Red, white and blue; what does it mean to you?
Surely you’re proud, shout it aloud,
“Britons, awake!”
The Empire too, we can depend on you.
Freedom remains. These are the chains
Nothing can break.

There’ll always be an England,
And England shall be free
If England means as much to you
As England means to me.

And to me.

Half my blood is English. The other half Irish. We are in civil war.

Free Northern Ireland.