The Birdman

Coming home from ‘Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’ earlier this evening I chanced to see the Birdman wandering down the street. Seeing the Birdman, all clean [for him] and shiny with fresh brushed hair bought something of a smile to my face. I like to know that Birdman’s all right. It makes it seem like there’s something right in the uncaring word. It appeals to my sense of justice, in a funny sort of way, and knowing that someone else is caring for him makes me feel less of a bitch.
Let me tell you about the Birdman.
He is something of a Newtown social feature, all unto his little self. The homeless man who, in a weird quirk, is not homeless at all. I know he’s not homeless because he used to be my next-door neighbour. Literally next-door. He had the bed-sit next to mine. My cockroaches were the descendants of his cockroaches. [Which explained why no matter how many I killed or how many mutants I created there were always new fresh unmutated ones. They obviously preferred my place because there was food to live on. I also think his place may have been a bit too grubby for them.] We shared stuff – like my complete avoidance and distant sympathy. We also shared a set of stairs where he would collect flotsam from Newtown’s wheelie bins. I discovered a lot about Newtown through him. The people round here throw out some weird shit which is understandable given what scrap it was. Less understandable is how and why they acquired it in the first place. His habit of collecting is one of the reasons I nicknamed him Birdman. Talking to him is, well, thoroughly frustrating and a mistake in case he remembers you, so I shunned all conversation and never learned his name – assuming, of course, that he’s know it to share it and was into that kind of formal exchange. So, anyway, Birdman for his Bower Bird ways and also for his habit of whistling, like a bird, to the birds and sundry persons who crossed his path. I used to wake of a morning not to the sounds of birds but to the sounds of Birdman. Twitter twitter. The other reason for calling him Birdman was the fact that he is off with the birds or possibly the pixies. His reality partly co-exists with ours and then moves on to something he evidently finds more palatable. A reality where he talks with the birds [or the pixies, whatever] and I think they probably respond in a mutually intelligible way. A reality where he chirps at people as they walk down the street and they smile because they know he is harmless.
He is harmless. He is also one of the many people who fall into the cracks of a city like this. He is incapable of looking after himself properly – by which I mean keeping sufficiently fed and clean. Not sufficient to my standards but to general health and well-being ones. He eats what he finds when he is hungry and finds it wherever. He has a room to live in but no real notion of keeping house. The electricity either baffles him or he doesn’t understand the need to change light bulbs or even buy them. I don’t think that they weren’t bought for want of money. He lived in a bed-sit, he had a key, this suggests ownership or rental. I doubt that he would be capable of being the rent payer, of getting money from the bank and handing it over. I’m not even sure that money greatly figures in his life. I’ve never seen him beg for it and I’ve never seen anyone give him any. I think it just doesn’t feature in his world. Much like the lights. If the light was switched on then all well and good, if not then not and not another thought about it. Someone, somewhere looks after at least some of his needs, perhaps underestimating what his needs are or perhaps his reality just shifted a little further away without them noticing. I know that he’s looked after because one day someone came and cleaned out his room – really cleaned. Truckloads of rubbish and muck removed. The place cleaned and fumigated. The cockroaches moving over by the droves and looking shinier than any of their predecessors. The Birdman disappearing for a few days before coming back freshly scrubbed and with a clean new jumper and pants that weren’t bordering on immodest. This happened after I’d lived there nearly a year. I had been known to wax lyrical about the fate of Birdman, the fate of Birdmen – especially while drunk at parties, his situation was analogous, I felt, to the state of the nation. Too many fall through the cracks. Dedicated policy to stop looking after those unable to look after themselves. An increase in people on the street, the closing of mental institutions to all but the dangerous or wealthy – and frequently letting the dangerous out for not being wealthy. The Birdman is one of those people, a person who needs care, who is not going to be rehabilitated because it simply isn’t possible. He has his world, and a right to it, but he does not have the right to be neglected and ignored because of the habits of our society. Yes, I preach. Hypocritically I do nothing about it but bitch and whine which is why seeing the Birdman all clean and shiny with fresh brushed hair makes me smile. Someone is doing something for somebody who needs it. I think that’s good to know.