Tramping Wearing Tie

When I go away for long weekends by the coast I always walk around the town to absorb the place. I always look out for tramps - not the aggressive beggars but tramps who seem to have dropped out life and have adapted to life in the gutter. I admire their nerves of steel - not knowing where the meal will come from, if someone will beat them to a pulp that night, where they’ll sleep next week, what they’ll do if they get ill, where they’ll spend icy winter nights and what will become of them. There’s nothing to jack up their lives - nothing to look forward to, no friends, holidays, soft bedsheets, Christmas, home life, purpose, music, toilet roll, prospects, personal library of books, salary. There’s also none of the main building blocks of live – a partner, someone to talk to at night, a shared life, someone looking out for you (don’t lean on those things myself.)

How do they live like that? How can they go down the road of life and miss all those turnoffs that save you from living as a tramp? Who is wondering where’ve they vanished to? Why aren’t they claiming a pension?

If I was a tramp I’d desperately need to have a radio about my person; a day without music and the human voice would greatly reduce life’s quality. I’d probably need a tub of peanut butter as well.

It haunts me to think a destitute life will happen to me. Perhaps its insecurity but even though I’ve saved up loads of money and invested well part of me expects it all to be taken away at any time. Lying in bed I imagine witnessing a man ill-treating a swan in the park, beating him to death then having to shed life’s normal skin and go on the run, living under motorway flyovers and stealing food.

Part of me identifies with tramps - cutting the strings of responsibility that are so plentiful they can form a net - then free-falling and dropping out altogether. I rented a flat out to a couple who had sold everything and bought a narrow-boat and nearly dropped out of society; they said canal life is laden with folk who have dropped out or are running from something.

I can remember being in Glasgow on business and in the evening I went out looking for somewhere to eat. Heavy rain slanted by a wind was come down and there was a tramp sat on a bench putting his face up to it as though it was warm welcome sun. I can remember one tipping a tub of Complan powder into his mouth then swilling it down with a bottle of water. I quite like cold chips so I could eat cold chips easily like tramps do.

In Whitby I can remember watching a tramp who was watching a young lad stuff a carton of chips in a full bin. The tramp moved in and slid them out while there was probably some heat left in them and ate them with mucky fingers.

Here is a painting of a tramp sitting in a gutter. I ensured I painted three things I have seen: a tramp wearing a tie, one with a cat on a lead and one with a thick book. Why would a tramp wear a tie? This always stuck with me.

This painting came easily (I’m sure the low quality reflects this) though before starting it I made the mistake of looking at photos of tramps I’ve taken over the years. I found one I’d taken at Marble Arch in London. I was sat on a bench eating a sandwich observing a tramp sat opposite. I feel a bit mean now but I approached him, stuck a camera close to his face and took a photograph. Suddenly his eyes came up and focussed; when he looked back at me I realised there was a real person in there. I felt awful. I took it in 2007 and wonder if he’s still alive? I hope he’s got a feather mattress and duvet in a dry warm room on the roof of one of the grander hotels though a crematorium assistant has probably scattered his ashes on an anonymous patch of soil in a Garden Of Remembrance.

Mmmm..looks okay…

Jackie Wright doesn’t seem to agree…

Er….what?

Time to add a bottle of Blue Nun…

The cat in based on my cat Twinkle…

This is the rambling tramp who was at Marble Arch in London. When I got up close his eyes opened wide and I saw the man underneath…