Urban Diary

As I slot the first flyer through the letterbox I cause the flap to fall back heavily making a terrible loud noise. This is completely unintentional and motivated perhaps by the sound of barely audible steps rushing to the door. I mistakenly take these to belong to a dog even though there is no “beware of” sign to be seen.
Thus begins my annual leaflet drop.

I love this part of my job. For one, it puts me in direct contact with the local community. In addition, it serves as further study of London’s urban life.

My regular beat starts in the block of flats located about a quarter of a mile away from the school where I am based. I usually end here, too, working my way around the neighbourhood in a circle. The low-rises sit in a triangular layout overlooking a patch of grass that has seen better days. As I walk past the front gardens of the ground-level houses and I am exposed to shoes of all types and sizes, I begin my usual fun-filled, mental guessing game. Flat-soled, open-toed sandals with wedge at the back? They probably belong to my Romanian crowd, usually Gypsy ones. Flat, dark brown, leather toe-looped sandals-cum-slippers? Usually, my Asian gang. “Chunky-looking”, cross-strapped, black sandals? Probably my African brethren.

Two north London football clubs vie for space on clotheslines, windows and doors. N17 White Hart Lane vs N7 Emirates take their battle off the pitch and on to this patch of early-morning, sun-drenched suburbia. In the air lingers the aroma of turmeric and ginger. Nice contrast to the smell of cannabis that wafts out of one of the windows on my right.

I go up the urine-stained stairs of one of the buildings and after dropping a few more flyers I gaze down at the green, rectangular patch below. Bereft of slides and see-saws, this is more dog territory than play area. As if to confirm my theory a bloke comes out with his canine in tow. Clad in a black, loose T-shirt and jeans, he reminds me of one of the lines in Blur’s Parklife: “I feed the pigeons, I sometimes feed the sparrows too/It gives me a sense of enormous well-being”. Well, he is only feeding his dog, which responds in kind by fouling on the grass a few times in the scarce minutes I am up on the first floor. Perhaps the dog has a funny tummy. But its owner has funny hands. They are completely unable to produce a little bag with which to dispose of the dog excrement.

I give a curt “you awright, mate?” to the stranger and cross over to the other side of the train station. Immediately the scenery changes. Fewer flats and more houses. A mix of social and private tenants probably renders this area the blue hue in mayor of London, Sadiq Khan’s recent graph of the capital’s property map. The further you go into London, the more amber and orange the colours are, denoting foreign ownership. But out here in the “burbs, it is still mainly UK buyers who go for local property. By UK, please, understand UK-based, not necessarily UK-born. Since I was last here a year ago, the amount of building work has increased. I exchange greetings with an Irish builder, his cockney geezer sidekick and a Polish driver (I know he is Polish. I can tell by the accent these days).

I almost bump into a lanky, forty-something chap as I leave the front garden of one of the houses. He is also on a flyer mission. His, however, is linked to the pizza takeaway on the high road. A mechanical, almost muted, accented “hello” escapes his lips as he mechanically moves from accommodation to accommodation, with a mechanical gait, probably mechanically counting how many leaflets he has got left to deliver. I skip the next house on account of the “No Junk Mail” sign on the door. Flyer-man does go in, leaving his promotional material tucked halfway in the letterbox. Mechanically, of course.

As I make my way back to the low-rises, I catch sight of the local postie. “Giving me competition, mate?”. Nah, I answer, I wouldn’t be able to do your miles with your heavy bag.  I walk away, fewer flyers in my hands now. Postman soon becomes a red dot on the urban horizon, his shorts and bare legs a barometer to indicate that autumn has not arrived yet.

© 2016

Next Post: “Thoughts in Progress”, to be published on Saturday 8^th October at 6pm (GMT)