wearing a furry onesie and a rugby scarf, his cheerfully watering eyes sparkled beneath a trucker cap. A beaming face framed with a snow white mottled beard a drunk wee aboriginal man, a jovial happy chap His approach suggested he had something significant to say I can only imagine…. my mind boggles. His hands contained a number of cigarette butts harvested from the cracks between the cobbles. I wasn't sure if it was the slurring or the slang or the slurry of the saliva slushing from within his toothless grin. He was incomprehensible ... It translated to “gotta a spare durry?” “of course mate”, Opening up my packet to pull one from within. My colleague was somewhat apprehensive and perhaps dismissive and defensive, not wanting to engage with what appeared to be a squanderer. I, on the other hand, could not help but feel some warmth and empathy for this rough sleeping wayward wanderer. He thanks me and continues on his way and then pauses… as if struck, by an epiphany. the conversation wasn’t over the transaction wasn’t complete he had something else for me. this old bloke had a joke and even though it was very old there was something very endearing in the way that it was told. he may have been out the gate, mad as a cut snake, and reaching for the lanyard around his neck, so there would be no mistake. His ID said his name was Gary. So if he ever got lost… (sic) someone could always find him and wandering off he roared into another fit of laughter and left a trail of smoke behind him. Can’t you hear it? because everything about him shouted “free spirit”, live in it be with it, in every minute, live in joy and live in peace. There's a madness in the air and he was there to steer it, persevere it and wear it, like a whimsy weaving ferret on a scurry through the streets. and I still grin when I think of him
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