Marked

Oh what is that sound which so thrills the air
Down in the valley, drumming, drumming!
Only the scarlet soldiers dear;
The soldiers coming.

WH Auden, 1932.

I couldn't believe he was still there.

I go out working in the early morning, regular as clockwork most days. Up at three; do this blog; have a bath; go for a walk, get ready for work; have a coffee down at A Little On The Side; make sure the kids are up and getting sorted for the school day; get to work by 7.30am; that's the routine.

Each morning, at the back of a housing block down Wilson Street, I would pass a bloke in a car, cooking up or who had just had a taste; must have been a shift worker having a blast of heroin on the way home from work in his little secret spot where he thought no one knew and where no one could see him. There was no reason why anybody would notice somebody sitting in a car in that spot, except I did.

In some way I felt some strange connection to him, like crossing paths with an older version of myself; time trails doing tricks. A bit over a week ago, I walked past, and there he was; but this time the car engine was running and the light was on inside the car; and you couldn't see him, he had collapsed sideways in the car. I kept walking a few feet, none of my business; these people can be erratic, dangerous; and particularly hostile to outside help. Then I stopped and stared, thinking better of it. The car engine just kept running, no sign of movement from him. So I rang the emergency number 000 and told them the story.

The police had trouble finding the place and rang me back, asking where I was. I walked to nearest corner; it's winter, it's still dark at this time of the morning; and read off the street names. The copper started to grill me; what sort of drugs is it. I don't know, I don't know; I kept replying, exasperated, the guy had overdosed and was probably dead by now; but I didn't want to open the door and start trying to save him, just to get assaulted. Finally an ambulance pulled up; the lights flashing from a long way off; and I pointed them the towards the car, its engines still runnning.

The last I saw was the ambulance officer banging on the car door, going, are you alright mate? As I walked away, the police passed me. I disappeared into the web of streets. I might have saved his life; but I didn't want the bloke knowing who had called the authorities. He was unlikely to be grateful. But maybe I had saved him; maybe that was the rock bottom he needed to begin his own climb out of addiction. Maybe, in some weird way, the fact that I was the only person on earth who knew that he was there doing what he was doing and had been able to step in in this way was all meant to be.

But then I went walking the other morning. I assumed he would never go back to that spot, could be in jail or detox for all I knew. But there he was, in a different car but in almost exactly the same spot, sitting secretively in the dark. I looked in his face, shocked; and we briefly exchanged glances as I scurried away, nervous. His face was pale, grey-sick, his eyes stoned and evil-dead; he looked like some evil elf out of Lord of the Rings; and that face, it clung in my mind all day; an evil spirit I did not want to be part of me.


THE STORY CONTINUES:

"The street hit him in a wave of disoriented light. The crowds were still dissipating, groups wandering around looking for action. He had emerged from something secret, intimate, furtive, far from the glorification of gay sexuality which had been so much a part of the formal part of the night.

"In back rooms, saunas and back alleys the grumblings and grunts, encounters to be savoured and boasted about, would go on till dawn. At least for a while the loneliness would be ripped away. He didn't care.

"He'd had too many rapid encounters, met too many bastards who just wanted to unload. He felt no personal sense of belonging. The days were gone when he would emerge blinking, tripping, part of the grand of the grand adventure, the great random congress of the night. He kept on walking, away from the Mardi Gras, the triumphs of the night, other people's nights. The centre of things was somewhere else."

THE BIGGER STORY:
Chicago Tribune:


'EVERYBODY WANTS TO BE LOVED'

Bush faces a lonely road
These days even some Republicans are questioning his course

By Mark Silva | the Tribune's White House correspondent
July 29, 2007

WASHINGTON - President Bush risks becoming increasingly isolated as he approaches his final year in the White House, experts say, as close advisers drift away, many in his own party turn against him, his policies meet strong resistance and even formerly ardent party supporters question his path.

The public has largely rejected the Iraq war, the central project of Bush's presidency, and Democrats are attacking the president with a new aggressiveness as his popularity reaches historic lows. More dramatically, Bush faces growing defections from his party, including the conservative wing that has previously supported him enthusiastically. And several of his closest aides -- such as Chief of Staff Andrew Card and counselor to the president Dan Bartlett -- are no longer in the administration, leaving Bush with fewer friends whose judgment he is willing to rely on.

Meanwhile, the Republican presidential candidates are carefully distancing themselves from Bush in certain key areas. Even U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Bush's strongest defender on Iraq, is offsetting that support with scorching commentary on the administration's conduct of the war.