Dodging puddles
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The narrator walks down a dark, rainy street on a dreary day. Boarded up houses that used to be homes now stand empty. An impoverished man tries unsuccessfully to roll a cigarette in the rain. Two dirty dogs menace the narrator but run away when confronted. The narrator takes shelter in a caf辿 where the waitress seems unhappy. The street's terraced houses are scheduled for demolition as the last remnants of the old working-class community disappear.
Dodging puddles
- 1. Walking along on a dark grey day trying to dodge puddles, wet clay on a dirty footpath sticks to my shoes making them muddy and heavy. Rain beats on my raincoat, beats on the back of my head, water flows down my collar down my back, my nylon shirt sticks to my cold skin. Boarded up terraced houses that used to be someones home now stand empty, rows of nothingness, these houses have lost their soul. A harsh bitter wind slams shutters, broken hinges rattle against Victorian red bricks and hammer on window sills, theres no one left to care. Over the way across the road a shabby man stands by a concrete lamppost, a fifty year old neon light that has had its day. The shabby man is soaked to his skin he looks at me as he tries to roll a cigarette, his hands are wet his paper tears, he looks away. A cold wind howls loudly as it blows along a terrace, gusting hard it billows my coat flaps forward, my wet hair forward. Reminds me of a picture I once saw of an American actress her dress all blown up, pretty girl with a sad life, a very sorry end. Two filthy wet dogs walk aimlessly from one side of the street to the other, barking at ghosts, sniffing at anything and everything. They stop as I walk past, look my way teeth bared, snarling looking for weakness they walk towards me growling a deep growl. Picking up a piece of wood fallen from one of the boards I hold it high, but they dont give a damn, so I swing at them hard. It catches one of them around the face, the dog yelps and barks loader, I take a step nearer then like all cowards they ran away. Theres a caf辿 on a corner I can see steam rising from an open window, an odour of fried food blows on a drizzling wind. So I went in for a hot steaming cup of tea and sat by a window wiping away condensation to look out, still raining, a shit day. A young girl who takes food orders sighs constantly, her eyes empty, is this what she dreamed of when leaving school? Bacon sandwiches seem to be the order of the day red or brown sauce, maybe both, plenty of sugar in the strong tea. This is the last living building on the street, wont be here much longer, the owners will move into another dying community. These old terraces are due for demolition theyre old working mans houses, two up two down housed loads of kids, six to a room. Cobblestone roads, horses and carts used to bounce along with their deliveries, coal, milk, rag and bone men, this road has real history. Kids played on these streets I wonder what became of them, how they grew up, did they have a better life than their parents, probably not? The class system back then was made of brick walls, if someone had the brains they would not have had the right provenance.
- 2. Lower class people were born to fail, it was not who you were it was where you live, how you talked, how you acted, who you knew. The people who lived in this street retaliated the only way they could, they hated them back, they hated the rich, hated the powerful. Culture can be a terrible thing, fathers proud when the eldest son drinks a pint of beer in one go, or when he smokes his first cigarette. They lived their lives for weekends, Saturday afternoons and Sundays, after giving their wives their house money they drank the rest. Rising for work on a Monday morning was a thing of silence a hangover enhanced their hatred, a hangover deepened deepest despair. As the houses cleared and the residents moved on to pastures new, did their culture go with them or was it left to rot with this street?