OCCUPIED COUNTRY

Hang Down Your Head

Oh shit. I think I may have been responsible for someone's final moments. Someone's death. I'm absolutely gutted. I can't stop thinking about what I should've done. I can't stop thinking about the error I made and the possible consequences. How could I have been so stupid? Why didn't I pay more attention? I might - just might - have made a difference.

To be honest I hadn't given the incident a moment's thought since it first happened last Friday evening. Dearest and I had been for our traditional early evening trip to local number two. Miserable Chris the barman had been at his depressing best so we decided to go home and cheer ourselves up watching holocaust documentaries. Just then Old Dot arrived with her son. Now Dot is one of those eternally cheerful eighty-odd year olds still chock full of fun and faculties. So we stayed for a few extra and a chinwag.

We probably left the pub around 10:00pm and sauntered the half mile back home. After a while I spot someone lay face down on the pavement with his feet in the gutter. I immediately thought "oh no - he must be dead". We both approached him. He looked like he had a shaved head and was wearing a bomber jacket of some description. When I got to within 4 or 5 yards of him, he let out a loud snore.

"He's pissed" I expertly concluded. We passed him by.

---

Last night we went to the weekly quiz in local number one. Our next door neighbour joins us most weeks.

"Hey we saw you last Friday night near the chippy, had you passed an old bloke face down on the floor?"

An 'old bloke'? What does he mean 'old bloke'?

"We passed a bloke yeah, but he wasn't old, he had a shaved head and a bomber jacket. He was pissed as a fart".

"No he wasn't. We passed you in the car and then passed the bloke. C made me stop the car and investigate. We think he'd had a heart-attack. C gave him mouth-to-mouth till the ambulance arrived. They took him off but I think he was dead". He was ninety.

"Ninety? He couldn't be..... He had a shaved head and........."

"He was bald - not shaved".

"But he was dressed.. well.... young".

"He was wearing carpet slippers".

Carpet slippers? How the hell had I missed them? He just looked.... YOUNG. I can only repeat it. He just appeared young.

"But he was snoring - we heard him".

"Snoring?"

"Well yeah... well he snored once anyway".

Oh bollocks. Had I mistaken a death-rattle for a snore? Would he have lived if we had intervened? I don't know. The next door neighbour probably got to him about one minute after we passed so there wouldn't have been that much of a time lag. Dearest and I wouldn't have been able to give him mouth-to-mouth either so perhaps it was for the best that it wasn't us who tried to help him.

But I can't help thinking I'm somehow responsible. Why did I automatically assume he was pissed? Why didn't I stop and think and make sure he was ok? It's because I stereotyped him. I thought it was just someone acting Chav-ish on a Friday night and drinking too much and I thought "I'm not getting involved 'cos your an arsehole".

But it wasn't a smashed Chav, it was a ninety year old (but he DID look young from the back) looking for the lid off his new re-cycling bin.

But Chav or Old 'un I should have stopped to help.

Some fucking Good Samaritan I'd have made.