» Tramps

The damed dog!! (go easy, it's my first time!)
Now, I'm not the most compassionate person when it comes to beggars an tramps.
Whenever I used to go into the town centre for shopping, there was always this one particular tramp (I named him Jeremiah in my head) who used to beg outside the River Island with his dog, a German Shepherd, in his sleeping bag. This guy never said a word when he was begging, he just had a little card board sign declaring his poverty, which is to my mind better than those who stop in front of you and beg, especially on trains.

Now, I always used to think (mostly out loud to friends) "if he's really that poor, how can he afford to keep a dog?"

As I said before I'm not especially compassionate about our monetary impaired friends, but I've always been a bit skeptical about the extent of their poverty when they're with small children or animals, especially when they look otherwise healthy.

So when I would see "Jeremiah" and his dog, I was always a bit suspicious... After several weeks of ignoring him every time I happened across his path, I was out in town one fairly chilly afternoon with a friend of mine who stopped and gave him some change. As he was routing through his pocket I noticed the dog was missing. I quite heartlessly assumed he decided to keep him home today as, but my friend was not so callus and asked him "hey where's you dog today mate?", turns out the poor bastard had died a week earlier from what he guessed was the cold and no fat on him from having nothing to eat...

I still tend to ignore the tramps I see, but I do it with a bit more sympathy for them!
(Thu 2nd Jul 2009, 22:01, More)