Well, just when you think you have got it all organised and now it is going to be tranquil, the Gods start digging more adventures out of their pockets.
Really I am never going to get anything done at this rate.
Last night at work was just about as tranquil as anybody could wish for. I sat on the taxi rank from half past six until half past midnight, during which time I had two customers. This was not my finest hour. My finest six hours.
I was not exactly surprised, the weather was truly dreadful. According to my phone it was minus three, and a bitter wind was swirling round, the sort that hurts your teeth when you smile at somebody, not that there was anybody to smile at, and I don’t imagine they would have smiled back anyway.
I gave up and went home in the end, and took the dogs out.
I was halfway around the Library Gardens when I discovered a bloke, huddled on a bench.
Obviously I almost jumped out of my skin, but said Good Evening, politely, and obliged Roger Poopy to desist from growling at him.
The bloke did not respond.
I wondered if he was dead, and said Good Evening a bit louder.
Eventually he turned his head.
I am of a bossy sort of disposition, and it was plain to me that he was in no way dressed for extreme weather. He had on jeans and a thin anorak, so I told him it was about time he was going home.
You will not be surprised to hear that he had no home to go to, nor any more surprised to discover that after a little while, during which my Higher Self wrestled furiously with the more Prosaic Self who did not at all want a half-dead alcoholic tramp anywhere near them, I took him home.
I told him he could sleep on the dog sofa in the conservatory, because the Prosaic Self has its limits and was absolutely not going to let my Higher Self anywhere near that particular show. As a gesture to my Higher Self I brought him an old quilt and told him on no circumstances was he to come into the house, and that as soon as the day dawned he was to buzz off.
I would like to say that I was wakeful with anxiety, worrying about the drunk tramp just a few yards away on the other side of an unlocked door. It was unlocked because I have lost the key, not because of any compassionate issues, and it was just too difficult to start trying to find it in the middle of the night.
Also I had weighed him up on his way in and decided that I would very easily be able to punch him on the nose should it come to fisticuffs, I might be old and fat but I am well fed and sober.
Anyway, I was not wakeful with anxiety and slept like a drunk tramp in an unexpectedly warm bed. You will be pleased to hear that I was neither robbed nor murdered, so you do not need to look anxiously ahead to the end to check.
When I got up the house was silent. Imagining that he must have gone on his homeless way, I opened the curtains, to discover that the world had become entirely white.
At least four inches of snow had fallen overnight. Quite clearly nobody was going anywhere.
Sighing, I went to rouse my tramp.
There is no getting out of Windermere once we have got so much snow.
He was in a bad state. He couldn’t stop shivering, which I thought was partly alcohol withdrawal, but it was also partly cold, I thought he probably had got himself into a state of mild hypothermia the night before. I gave him a cup of tea and listened to his half-invented story about his employer booting him out. I pointed out that this was entirely likely to be because of his chronic alcoholism, and suggested that he considered the doctor’s as a first stop.
He slept, exhaustedly, after that, until one o’clock in the afternoon, when I woke him up and told him that he needed to resolve his homelessness problem before nightfall. He hinted, quite heavily, that he would like to continue to live in our house, but I was relentless, and sent him on his way with an instruction to start at the GP and also to visit his previous employer and request the use of his old room for a while. Then there are Social Services and the hostel in Kendal.
He staggered away.
It took me a while to fumigate the stale alcohol fumes out of the conservatory, they were almost as bad as the cat difficulties of the previous day. I washed everything and disinfected his teacup, which was inexplicably but disgustingly sticky.
In the end it started to rain. The snow has dissolved into a dreadful slippery slush, alongside filthy pools of melted snow. I am on the taxi rank now, and the forecast is for a hard overnight frost.
I am not looking forward to this.
I hope my tramp has found somewhere to go.
