Yesterday I was awoken by the screams and curses of my next door neighbours slogging it out on their doorstep yet again. Here at the Northcott Concentration Camp Housing tenements, we the working poor, pensioners, the insane and disabled, fight like gladiators in the pit of our own desolation, taking our frustrations out on those piled on top of us, for there seems no redress to a higher power and contemporary life has few other cathartic consolations. This time it was my dear 85 year old Dolly, the ex-barmaid, two doors up, shrieking about another outrage Eric the schitzo Viking has committed. He lives between me and her, suffers so badly from psychosis it has twisted his body and mind like a pretzel; his flat is pure filth, faeces wiped on the walls waist high, tho he leaves his taps running 24/7 so that water leaks in streams thru the brickwork; and he howls at some unknown moon like an opera singer in Bedlam, to send cold shivers up all our spines who are unfortunate enough to live near him.
I heard Dolly threatening to smack him in the chops, to throw a bucket of cold water on him, to have him carted away, but even the worst of nursing homes wont have him, we the Public Housing inmates must be the ones to nurse his outbursts. Dolly has lived here for 45 years, it was her who cut the ribbon on the opening of this worker's Utopian Bauhaus monolith; at the caring "Shitty Bricks" "community togetherness show" held recently in the car-park she was given a bouquet of flowers in appreciation of her stalwart longevity; in ancient Roman times she would've been given the freedom of the city as a true survivor of the arena but here she could be murdered for her troubles and there'd just be the usual tut-tutting about rats in boxes by the Daily Terror newspapers.
The poor old girl shouldn't have to slog it out with a Frankenstein-like monster, he really can't look after himself and should be in assisted-care but the State has long washed it's hands of public Mental Health, the Community can deal with the horror, actually us hopeless arseholes in public housing are the ones stuck with it. But, of course, we are really poor examples for Dolly to follow as we fight like cats and dogs, the ice-junkies throwing furniture from their balconies, the Indigenous Aussies (Kooris) hollering and smashing beer bottles on each others heads, the anarchist artists kicking and punching over piles of garbage we think would make great conceptual sculpture: 86 year old Dolly has just given into group pressure and thinks it's normal behaviour to slog it out physically, it's too tiring to diplomatically sort out the differences, and nobody's listening.
I'm one of the worst offenders, often erupting from my flat in a fury, swearing and slamming breakables on walls, mostly with Cursula the ogre on the other side of me who is forever building beaver-like heaps of rubbish in front of my door and would rather tear my flesh with her claws than throw out some useless styro-foam cups, broken umbrella or cracked china.
Anyway, I went outside and soothed old Dolly's nerves, pleading with her to not get physical with Eric as it was not only dangerous for her, he might lash out and hit her, but quite unseemly for an 85 year old to be having a slog-fest with a 6ft 4inch retard. She said she always took notice of what I said and would remain quietly indoors, forgetting about the bucket of water she had at the ready. So please salute us Northcott gladiators for we are about to die in our monumental hovels, with no one to lend succor, for a neo-Nero like our P.M. Johnny Cowherd stands on his high podium and gives us battling plebs the thumbs down!
I heard Dolly threatening to smack him in the chops, to throw a bucket of cold water on him, to have him carted away, but even the worst of nursing homes wont have him, we the Public Housing inmates must be the ones to nurse his outbursts. Dolly has lived here for 45 years, it was her who cut the ribbon on the opening of this worker's Utopian Bauhaus monolith; at the caring "Shitty Bricks" "community togetherness show" held recently in the car-park she was given a bouquet of flowers in appreciation of her stalwart longevity; in ancient Roman times she would've been given the freedom of the city as a true survivor of the arena but here she could be murdered for her troubles and there'd just be the usual tut-tutting about rats in boxes by the Daily Terror newspapers.
The poor old girl shouldn't have to slog it out with a Frankenstein-like monster, he really can't look after himself and should be in assisted-care but the State has long washed it's hands of public Mental Health, the Community can deal with the horror, actually us hopeless arseholes in public housing are the ones stuck with it. But, of course, we are really poor examples for Dolly to follow as we fight like cats and dogs, the ice-junkies throwing furniture from their balconies, the Indigenous Aussies (Kooris) hollering and smashing beer bottles on each others heads, the anarchist artists kicking and punching over piles of garbage we think would make great conceptual sculpture: 86 year old Dolly has just given into group pressure and thinks it's normal behaviour to slog it out physically, it's too tiring to diplomatically sort out the differences, and nobody's listening.
I'm one of the worst offenders, often erupting from my flat in a fury, swearing and slamming breakables on walls, mostly with Cursula the ogre on the other side of me who is forever building beaver-like heaps of rubbish in front of my door and would rather tear my flesh with her claws than throw out some useless styro-foam cups, broken umbrella or cracked china.
Anyway, I went outside and soothed old Dolly's nerves, pleading with her to not get physical with Eric as it was not only dangerous for her, he might lash out and hit her, but quite unseemly for an 85 year old to be having a slog-fest with a 6ft 4inch retard. She said she always took notice of what I said and would remain quietly indoors, forgetting about the bucket of water she had at the ready. So please salute us Northcott gladiators for we are about to die in our monumental hovels, with no one to lend succor, for a neo-Nero like our P.M. Johnny Cowherd stands on his high podium and gives us battling plebs the thumbs down!
