Bum

Hello
Hello. Have you been here long?
Oh, ten minutes. I'm usually early.
It's quite warm here, don't you think?
That never bothers me much, to be honest with you.
You're very fortunate.
Say, what's that noise?
What noise?
That noise. Over there!
I don't hear anything.
There it is again!
Yes, I hear it too now.
But that's...

I played a bum last night, in acting class. In two's, we were given the above text which we had used before and the task was to use the text, do something physical to portray your character, define the setting, and to try to get the other player to do something for you.

The second I pulled on my jacket, messed up my hair and made my way towards the makeshift counter for soup, soul and salvation, I was old, homeless, alcoholic and, apparently, funny.

Mumbling, occasionally ranting, glaring and gesticulating at passers by. With stooped gait and shuffling feet, I was sweating inside the winter jacket. A tired, sick, bitter old woman with just enough wit left to bamboozle the chirpy believer stirring the soup.

I inhabited that person, didn't hear the laugher though I did laugh myself. Responded to the audience, though they weren't there. Talked with the other player, but never looked her in the eye. Spoke words that weren't written, really hated a soup that wasn't there, wanted that drink and got a spoon I didn't have tangled up in dirty strands of hair.

We brought the scene to its unwritten conclusion. The other player apologised for laughing too much. I hadn't noticed.

Whether it was good or bad, I don't know and that's besides the point anyway.

The point is, I took that character home with me. Cycling home, trying to shake it off. She was still with me when I woke up the next day, went to work. I thought about her on the platform, waiting for the 8:53. I thought about her when I roughly told a beggar to fuck off.

There but for the grace of god.

I keep thinking of her, because that was my alternative reality me. Because it could still be me, one day. Because I touched fear there, for a few moments.

{the photo is a publicity shot of my father in an (amateur) play he appeared in in the mid Seventies. I don't think he ever took that character home with him, but I did rehearse his lines with him a lot.}