Freezing

It's severely fucking cold right now, look out for people. You are not 'above' talking to homeless people. People face endless danger when sleeping on the streets as it is, let alone when temperatures are falling below 0'C.


I moved to Salisbury in November 2009 for six months while my boyfriend was in his first year at Bournemouth university. The town itself is quite 'pretty' but other than that it's the worst place I've ever lived. Very middle class, very Conservative, and in turn very stuck up. Topshop is their idea of a 'thrifty' Saturday go-to-store.
For somewhere so small and on the surface so affluent, the number of people living on the streets or in temporary, insecure housing is extremely high. I remember one man in particular - his name was Sonny - who used to stand by the library and distribute leaflets about social responsibility: he always had a smile on his face as he tried and failed to strike up conversations with passers by. Once, when walking to work, I had my 'bitchface' on and he asked me what was wrong. He told me to be happy, to think about the positive things about my day rather than the negative... a guy without a home and with very little to call his own was trying his best to make me feel better. Since then, I now try harder to focus my energy on to resolving things that are 'going wrong' and being more appreciative of the things I do have. My home, my boyfriend, my friends and family, my good fortune to be in education with decent health and unnecessary luxuries that many of us take for granted: a wardrobe full of clean clothes, a computer, a phone, a bath, a living room; the list is endless.


I moved out of Salisbury in May 2010. When I next went back to visit in September of the same year, my boyfriend told me that Sonny had been found dead by one of the pillars next to the library. He was hunched over and nobody thought to ask him if he was okay. When the police and the paramedics got to him they found he had suffered a heart attack hours beforehand.
All the people that saw him every single day while they went about their day didn't think to stop and ask if he was alright. Not one person took it upon themselves to recognise him as a human being equal to them and in turn offer some kind of compassion or concern. This was a man who tried to improve the mood of the privileged even though he was living below the bread line himself, and yet not one of these self-involved, arrogant fucking cunts even tapped him on the shoulder to see if he was alright.


You are not better than anyone. You are not more deserving, you do have the time, and you should make sure people are alright. There are a million reasons why people end up having to face sleeping rough night after night and not one of them is for your dissection, criticism or judgement.

All those people in Salisbury that thought themselves too important, too busy or too indifferent to extend some kind of humanity to Sonny that day are essentially walking around with blood on their hands. If the first person to walk past him had stopped to ask if he was okay, they would have realized he wasn't and he may still have been alive today.

The weather is freezing right now. If you have a spare blanket going to waste, donate it to someone. Buy someone a hot drink or give them some money to get a hot meal. Tell them where your local night shelter is in case they don't know. If you hurry past someone, trying not to meet their eye, you know you are behaving like an asshole.
Look out for people. Treat people in the same way you'd want to be treated, look out for people the way you'd want others to look out for the person you love most in the world.