tube 20 June 2008
I’ve been thinking a lot about the night on the Tube during the week when I gave my seat up to the lil fella. Not that, exactly, but this – when I got out at Piccadilly Circus the whole of London seemed to be trying to get in and there was a homeless young guy halfway up the steps that the WHOLE of London was trying to pretend wasn’t there – some other mother’s son, as you might say. People were all but stepping on him in their haste to get elsewhere. He was a truly sorry sight – bearded, shoeless, filthy and shaking. Like everyone else I just about stepped over him and went on my way…and then I went back, gave him a few bob and stroked his hand while I did (really, really dirt encrusted) and I bet I was the only one to touch him in a long time. Anyhow, I usually don’t give cash to the people on the streets, for whatever reason (I’m more of a structured, consistent sort of help/supporter type) and I don’t care what he used it on so long as he got a bit of comfort out of it, no matter how slight and fleeting. Goes back, I know, to a great few months when I rented my mate Trudy’s flat off Clapham Common, near the old Town, view of the Common (should have bought it – another story) and there was a young teenager living rough around the doorways nearby. I never asked him how he was or why he was there, and one day when I passed him by I suspect he was crying and I never stopped to enquire after the circumstances and I am SO ASHAMED that I did not. It haunts me, truly. Living in a fast town is no excuse for not caring. I never saw him again. I regret that hugely. I hope it won’t happen again.
