Today I met..

...Peter on my walk on Climping Beach this morning, I spied him on my way over towards West Beach & was very curious (ok I'll admit I was darn right nosey) as to why he was drying his clothes on the beach & what his story was. On the way back I decided to say hello & we got chatting. Peter has walked from Penzance along the Coast to Climping some 260+ miles by road & is on his way to Brighton. Last night he slept in his tent in a little stone hut with no roof & hardly any walls half way between Elmer Beach & Climping in the gusty winds, I dread to think where he slept the night before in even gustier winds & torrential rain.

He has fallen on hard times & finding work in current climes was proving difficult, an engineer by trade, working for many years in the motor racing trade & more recently for a firm in the Oxford area making furniture for Police Stations & Jails & in an effort to keep active & not stagnate he has taken to walking round the Coast as a way to fill his time, rather than drinking, smoking & getting up to no good! He shared how much weight he lost & how healthy he felt. We chatted about how he was managing on his journey, eating, washing and the likes and how he was enjoying the simple side of life with only having to worry about himself & that he didn't really need much on a day to day basis. I asked him if he was missing anyone or was anyone missing him, to find a life of constant travel in the motor racing trade has left him without ties & moving about is a way of life to him.

We talked about the current economic climate & politics and how it is impacting on people in different ways & how even though we are more wiser to the corruption, covers up & spin that the UK does not seem to be changing very much in ways seems to be getting worse. It was one interesting conversation.

I queried what his plans are once he gets to Brighton. I asked him if he was going to be somewhere warmer when the harsh winter sets in but was not terribly convinced with his answer & we parted discussing his onward journey.

If you see Peter on his way from Climping to Brighton say hello, very pleasant & interesting chap!

Meeting Peter reminded me of this poem we learnt in Primary School, it always makes me feel very sad & reminds me how lucky we are to have all we have. What really do we have to complain about when we are healthy, have family & friends to love & who love us & have a roof over our heads, not a lot really...

An Old Woman of the Roads

O, TO have a little house!
To own the hearth and stool and all!
The heaped up sods upon the fire,
The pile of turf against the wall!

To have a clock with weights and chains
And pendulum swinging up and down!
A dresser filled with shining delph,
Speckled and white and blue and brown!

I could be busy all the day
Clearing and sweeping hearth and floor,
And fixing on their shelf again
My white and blue and speckled store!

I could be quiet there at night
Beside the fire and by myself,
Sure of a bed and loth to leave
The ticking clock and the shining delph!

Och! but I'm weary of mist and dark,
And roads where there's never a house nor bush,
And tired I am of bog and road,
And the crying wind and the lonesome hush!

And I am praying to God on high,
And I am praying Him night and day,
For a little house?a house of my own?
Out of the wind's and the rain's way.

~ Padraic Colum