Man With Bread
The face of labour on the street
Some days, bread warm from the oven makes it easier to forget I’ve nothing else to eat. But not today. Not after being told to wait while the baker’s wife helped those women in expensive coats who were in a hurry to choose pastries for their tea, as if making a fuss is the same as working hard. I could feel them looking down their noses at my boots and overalls, noticing how dirty they were, which is true this close to the weekend. Probably reckoned I smell bad, too. I could tell from their faces they were asking themselves how someone like me has the brass neck to use the same bakery they do and wondering if they should haggle a discount or threaten to take their custom somewhere else. When I see myself the way people like them see me, grubby from work and needing the shave I can’t have before I go on shift because there’s no hot water till the fire’s alight and I leave home too early for that, it rubs in how hard it is for people who don’t have money to keep their self-respect.
It’s every day and all of life
This’ll sound ridiculous, it does to me really, but what hurt most wasn’t queue-jumpers making me wait – I know how hard the baker and his missus work, how they need their better-off customers more than the likes of me – it was seeing those women stare at the safety pin I use when it’s cold to keep my jacket closed where there isn’t a button. People like that, they can’t imagine not having the proper clothes for every kind of weather. How did I deal with it? The best way I could. I had enough money for a bread roll, so I jingled the coins as if I had a pocketful while they stood pointing like greedy kids at what they’d decided to buy and I looked straight through them. Not much else I could do, was there? No point mouthing off, it would’ve ended up turning nasty. Anyway, my break’s only half an hour and working outside all day, I needed a piss more than a row, so I let it go. You have to, don’t you? You just have to.
People become what they become
• Ken Head's poetry weblog is at www.listeningforlight.blogspot.com and he'll appreciate your dropping in to browse and maybe leave a comment if you're passing.
