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A moment of colour
Oct. 26th, 2004 02:13 pmStrolling through the centre of Stevenage is always a depressing experience, especially for someone like me who doesn't think that Burberry is the dernier cru of fashion.* It's a grim place, possibly the best exemplar (other than Mexborough) of how people can be created by their crushing, stultifying environment. The town centre of Stevenage was designed to be a glorious hymn to the possibilities of pre-stressed concrete back in the 1960's; a pleasant place to live brought to us by that post-Stalinite Socialist period of architecture when privately-educated and publically-employed lefty architects thought that what the people really wanted was large expanses of concrete, high rise tower blocks with lots of dark corners, and above all nothing to do all day except sit in the main shopping precinct waiting for Margaret Thatcher to come along and actually give them something to buy. Like I say, it's a depressing place.
Whilst belittling epithets like 'pram-face' and 'chav' are derogatory and probably do as much to compound social inequality as much as any amount of well-intentioned post-industrial Concrete ever will, it's a place where you can walk and understand why these terms ever came to exist.
I was wandering down the main shopping precinct at lunchtime, enjoying as much as the surroundings allowed me the feeling of the increasingly crisp, wintry sunshine, when I came across one of those eco-friendly pest controllers that councils hire - a man with a Harris Hawk on his arm pointing it at pigeons and setting it upon them.
Of course, there's not a worse time to carry out such an operation. It's lunchtime and the shops and pubs are open, and so the locals were surging past him with nary a sideways glance and scattering the pigeons whenever one alighted for long enough to make an enticing target. It's odd that a man in a town centre with a bird of prey on his arm can attract so little attention, but nobody except me even appeared to have noticed him as the locals thundered past, their tracksuit-hungry eyes fixed upon the entrance to JD Sport.
I was briefly entranced. The bird was completely unruffled by the constant comings and goings and just glared about, as if sizing up every teenager as potential prey. As I watched I couldn't help but think how much my day would have been improved if the pest controller had brought with him something bigger, like a bald eagle trained to attack upon sight of Burberry Check and nylon. Enlivened by the thought of one of the spotty, surly, teenagers who infest the centre of Stevenage trying to look intimidating but just managing to look like spotty, surly teenagers being carried away and devoured by an eagle, I returned to the office in a sunnier frame of mind.
Occasionally I glance out of the window on the off chance that an enormous bird of prey with a bundle of something that looks like bloodied Burberry in its talons might swoop past. I've been disappointed so far, but the day isn't over yet.
* "Whatcha fuckin' dressed like that for?"
Whilst belittling epithets like 'pram-face' and 'chav' are derogatory and probably do as much to compound social inequality as much as any amount of well-intentioned post-industrial Concrete ever will, it's a place where you can walk and understand why these terms ever came to exist.
I was wandering down the main shopping precinct at lunchtime, enjoying as much as the surroundings allowed me the feeling of the increasingly crisp, wintry sunshine, when I came across one of those eco-friendly pest controllers that councils hire - a man with a Harris Hawk on his arm pointing it at pigeons and setting it upon them.
Of course, there's not a worse time to carry out such an operation. It's lunchtime and the shops and pubs are open, and so the locals were surging past him with nary a sideways glance and scattering the pigeons whenever one alighted for long enough to make an enticing target. It's odd that a man in a town centre with a bird of prey on his arm can attract so little attention, but nobody except me even appeared to have noticed him as the locals thundered past, their tracksuit-hungry eyes fixed upon the entrance to JD Sport.
I was briefly entranced. The bird was completely unruffled by the constant comings and goings and just glared about, as if sizing up every teenager as potential prey. As I watched I couldn't help but think how much my day would have been improved if the pest controller had brought with him something bigger, like a bald eagle trained to attack upon sight of Burberry Check and nylon. Enlivened by the thought of one of the spotty, surly, teenagers who infest the centre of Stevenage trying to look intimidating but just managing to look like spotty, surly teenagers being carried away and devoured by an eagle, I returned to the office in a sunnier frame of mind.
Occasionally I glance out of the window on the off chance that an enormous bird of prey with a bundle of something that looks like bloodied Burberry in its talons might swoop past. I've been disappointed so far, but the day isn't over yet.
* "Whatcha fuckin' dressed like that for?"
