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| Image courtesy of AJ Cann |
sometimes boring is actually what we all want. On Monday evening when I took the dog downstairs for his pre bedtime ablutions, There was a detective hanging about. Only the following day did I work out that he was waiting for the SOCO (Scene of Crime Officer) - for everyone who watches telly that means CSI.
Since I live in a place where someone gets robbed or beaten with unsurprising regularity, this detective did not look out of place. I didnt bat an eyelid. The following morning I went out and there was a far more visible police presence and I knew something more than simply the average assault was going on. nevertheless when my daughter turned up later in the afternoon she told me that it was "teeming" with cops downstairs and so we learned that there had been a murder...
Again, 113 apartments in the block, plenty of which are suncontracted by the local authority to rehabilitate homeless families and individuals, many of whom have a history of drug dependency - of uts going to happen - This would be one of the first places to look....
But I have lived in these tower blocks for four years. I have slowly come to know the people. And its a mix like you dont get anywhere else. Refugees from the far flung corners of the world, Iraq, Syria, DRC, Somalia, Eritrea, Zimbabwe, Women fleeing domestic violence, Low income hard working families, Economic migrants from The Orient particularly China, eastern Europe and the previous Soviet Bloc, Poland, Hungary, Bulgaria, Csechoslovakia.
And then there is the drug problem....... Heroin and Cocaine with plenty of weed thrown in, except that of course I am a liberal and think weed, its use and control are deeply misunderstood. The hard stuff like Heroin and Cocaine well that's another matter.
Of course to the average Joe who lives in pretty suburbia and is generally veiled from the realities of addiction, dealing and the violent underbelly of our society, drug dealers and junkies are just objects, not real people, with real lives. But I know these people too.
They are incredibly difficult to live around. They are a reflection of the failure of the rest of society and not just their own mistakes. I am not saying it is OK to take drugs become an addict and then blame the rest of functioning society. I am saying that the formula to tackle the problems that drug and alcohol abuse bring, clearly isn't working.
I really believe that our local and central authorities should be held to account for their strategy development in dealing with these problems, but those voters that matter generally dont live in places where they are affected first hand by these ills and thus these policies and strategies are not higher up their priority list.
In one of the flats on our landing are a couple housed by the local authority. They have a lifelong history of drug abuse and were clean for several months until a dealer moved into the flat below them. very quickly the were shooting up and became a problem. Addicts when high lose sense of their surroundings in any context. I have been offered lots of deals on shop lifted merchandise, but what gets me the most is that I get knocks on the door at five in the morning or midnight. There is no understanding that actually those of us that work cant catch up on sleep during the day!
This blog is actually written for Brian Martin because I am convinced that he will be demonised by whoever was responsible for his death, once they are caught. The truth is that he never caused me a problem. he was courteous, friendly and even offered a good laugh from time to time. It is incredibly sad that he lay dead in his flat for several days before he was found and I should have noticed. I know we were merely acquainted by virtue of where we live, and by any other criteria we would probably not known each other. He however never caused me a bother, was gentle and kind and made good conversation. He was a breed apart. While he allegedly also had a drug history, I never saw him high in the communal parts of the building and I never saw him behave badly.
Brian was somebody's brother, somebody's child. Like all of us, he had his problems, but he will be remembered by someone with a positive memory.
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