Windsor at night, you can't see a thing because of the shadow cast by the castle, the oldest and/or biggest in Europe, I didn't really read the tour guide pamphlet. Monday is the quietest day of them all, everybody recovering from an alcohol induced hysteria, the brain shrinks and pulls away from the skull, at least that's what the professionals tell me.
Thames Street it located right beside that Castle with the Curfew Tower looming over Wetherspoons, Burger King and McDonald's to name but a few. This area has a reputation to live up to, it is, after all, the Queen's front yard. A police car pulls up at about five minutes to midnight and two anonymous officers strut towards a pair of homeless men in a doorway between Pizza Hut and Starbucks. "Move along" they say in their own politely official tone, "move away before we set the tasers on you."
I don't know what it is about homeless people that appeals to me most. I think it's the fact that they quite literally have nothing left to lose. They tell the police to fuck off which, to my surprise, they do.
I saw these guys sitting there begging for change about an hour previously. I gave them nothing but a surprised stare. Why? The older of the two had, perched upon his shoulder, a regular, garden variety crow. This wasn't his crow by any means, maybe it just took a liking to this bum, but it was sitting right there on his sleeve happily observing the passing tide of civilized humanity.
And then I thought for a moment, you tend to think when you're avoiding money-grabbing bums. I thought "does that guy know something I don"t?'. Nonsense on the face of it, but when you consider it carefully, have you ever managed to coax a bird onto your shoulder? This is a skill that warrants some investigation, not that it has any practical uses, mind you.
It does have some interesting connotations. Are the homeless more in tune with nature? God knows they have all the time in the world to hone this skill. Did that crow simply consider this static creature to be a part of the furniture and if so was that bum just glad to have anything close to a friend?
It doesn't take very long before a group of drunken men roll over the horizon. They are singing and shouting "Chelsea" at the top of their voices. The homeless guy looks crestfallen as his only friend in the world flies off in an act of instinctive self-preservation and I start to wonder. Why do the homeless have such a bad reputation? In this one moment stuck between the homeless and the horde of drunken louts, I know who I would rather spend time with.
Sure that unfortunate guy, sitting in a doorstep might have poor hygiene and failings in social graces but for some reason, I feel a lot more secure in his presence than in that of these mind bent crazies reeking of Hugo Boss and barely wearing the finest clothes.
At the end of the day, I'm a hypocrite. I recognize the moral superiority of the downtrodden man but live a life of decadence in contrast. Still, I feel I can sit upon my ivory tower as the brainless hooligans chew each other at my feet.
