Other street people I have known

After moving to the south west I got to know many on the traveller scene. I had lived in a va n and a caravan back in my early twenties. Spending time in Kent at piglets wood and other sites where the convoy would go to pick fruit and prepare to invade Wiltshire like bands of medieval brigands. So it was walking and homely to meet up with similar types again. Times had changed. During Margaret thatchers time in office the government had waged war on the new age travellers and though the media spotlight moved on they were still persecuted. This had a dramatic effect. Those who chose to continue the lifestyle were a much hardier breed. The tern brew crew was coined when I was young. They were the troublesome mad types who would struggle to get a foothold anywhere else in society. Many suffering from what straight people would call mental illness and addiction. These were a peripheral minority when I was on the road but after the governments attack on alternative lifestyles became the majority. The groups and sites became far more tight knit. Less trustful of straights and outsiders. Having said that, once you were known they would look out fr you. There survival has always depended n keeping any strife internal, always avoid policeetc. It seems odd writing this ow as three I know well are about to go on trial for murder. I can,t write about this yet as they have still to be tried and anything I said may affect this. Some travellers would never beg. Of those who would each approached it in their own way and drew lines for themselves. One lad I knew from site I saw in town reading DOstoyevski with a hat in front of him. He would study the psychology of those passing by and their patterns and reasons for giving or ot doing. He always looked so young. Intelligent too. So why choose this way? It seemed to me he had fallen for fashion in a sense. Perhaps not an obvious one but he lived a myth of himself that may have had routes in literature, George Orwell, that sort of thing. Heroin gave him the reason to beg and a way to bare the cold. I don,t think he ever felt degraded as I would have. Two close friends of mine used to go begging in Bath and a daily b,of of their lives would make a good read. They were toughened heroin addicts. Never sought help from the NHS so in some ways their code was a pure one. They took it on the chin. A tough life too and usually a short one. I think life expectancy for street people is less than 50. They often die much younger. These two were always in good spirits, had interesting lives. Kim is a great painter. I have one of his works he gave me to look after. His technique is unusual and not like any other I have seen. K is amongst my best friends. Never as good a bigger as Jim. I don,t know why but he rarely earned half what Jim would. He never had an established pitch and perhaps has a less smiley face. He is more f an outdoors man. Often disappearing for weeks on end in to the woods. Catching rabbits, fish. Feeding himself and his dog from his surroundings. Society is just not set up to accommodate some of these people. Broken biscuits Jim once described them all as. Death is common and conversation will come round to who has died and where. Perhaps there was easier paths for them 20 or 30 years ago. Before plastic credit and debit cards excluded those on cash economies for many things. When driving licenses had no photos on. Before east Europeans took all farm labouring jobs. When, under thatcher we were so much worse off and subculture blossomed with music, theatre, art, clubs made by and for the unemployed without profit at there centre. When there was a free festival scene and new age travellers were many, before Glastonbury ate up there culture and fed it back to office workers wanting a crazy weekend before going home to their mortgages. I sometimes think the great days of British tramps are gone and the country is a less colourful place for their loss. Yet there will be someone out there now, raiding the bins behind M&S for food, huddled in blankets in a doorway or dancing in some field to music only they can hear. There are still free festivals. There are still many groups of travellers but they seem much more divided. One site, a year or two back grew and grew. Some were sending their kids to school. Living off whole foods and living low carbon impact lives . But across site was a ghetto of heroin addicts and alcoholics. Between we're all the layers you get in conventional society. These patterns form, these hierarchies seem to always form. I miss K. We would go off on adventures. When I had some mad scheme, lkie driving down to the Thames estuary and getting a boat to get across to shivering sands derelict wartime military defences, it would be K who would have the bottle and we would spur each other on. I have no other friend who, at the drop of a hat will come on some hair brained adventure. Right, I am inspired. I will ring him. I want to check out the oil refinery and pipelines behind Bristol. Let's go.