At the next meeting of the crime prevention sub-committee that I had joined, I reported what the young people had said. I also said that I'd organise a workshop for them, at which they could draw or sketch their ideas for the shelter artwork. The following week I went to the park again to inform the young people about the proposed workshop. I displayed some flyers advertising the workshop, pasting them in places in and near to the skatepark, trying to ensure that they would be clearly visible to the young people. The workshop was to be to be held at the local arts centre, The Cut, which is just a few hundred metres from the park. I also printed out about 40 flyers. Lorraine said she'd give them out to the young people when she went to the park on her regular round.
The day of the workshop arrived. Monday July 30, 2007. I was looking forward to seeing the young people in The Cut arts centre- usually there are mostly older, middle-class people there. I had prepared the art materials and bought kit-kats (chocolate bars), mineral water, paper cups, etc. I arrived at The Cut at 7pm, prepared the room and the materials. Lorraine and Hester arrived at 7. We waited until 7.30 and, disappointingly, no-one showed up. When I mentioned this, some weeks later, to an experienced community worker, Iain Tuckett of Coin Street Community Builders, he was not surprised that no-one turned up. "It's a matter of culture", he explained. I had underestimated the power of this aspect of 'culture'. Although The Cut is just a few hundred metres away from the skatepark, in physical distance, in 'cultural distance' it is on the other side of the world.
We decided to pack up and take some pencils and paper down to the park. The young people were busy talking, drinking and smoking. To help 'establish rapport' I accepted a can of Carling from Westley. Some of the young people eventually did some sketches, one or two of them quite promising. When I got home that night, I had a look through the drawings. One boy had drawn a Burberry-patterned baseball cap and a doughnut. He's got a job cooking doughnuts somewhere. Another boy, who had been praised as being a good artist, drew a head with a penis and pubic hair coming out of it, with the word 'You" at the top. His way of saying "You dickhead". A third youth drew a bottle of beer. The label read 'Stella Actatwat', accompanied by the slogans 'Chavs Should Move To Beccles' and 'Drinking Is For Noobs'. A young man smoking a joint drew a nice rural landscape changing into a cityscape, to go on the inside of the shelter. A thin, pale girl drew some nice little graphic symbols - yin-yang, a cartoon face taking some ecstasy tablets, a couple of mushrooms and some clouds with lightning. One boy did some lettering saying 'Hendo' underneath which he wrote the word CORPZ, a skull taking the place of the O. Two girls did happy girlish pictures of sub-Manga style faces with the slogan 'Halesworth Engoy'. The mother of a two-month old baby drew a fly-agaric mushroom, her baby being passed around the young people while she drew. A boy boy drew some quite stylish squiggles which could be turned into a good decorative element, while another simply wrote on his sheet "Kangaroos - a nice colour like pink". Interesting, I thought, this is the sort of raw material I can work with.
I reported all this back to the sub-committee and learnt that the local council was delaying things and requiring full planning permission for the shelter, having earlier said that this would not be necessary. I continued to visit the young people in the park over the summer and into the autumn, every couple of weeks. It was good to get to know them better, although not many more drawings were done for the shelter. On September 24, a Monday, I went again to the park in the evening with Hester and Lorraine to chat with the young people and keep them informed about the project. We told them that the shelter was now due to be installed in mid-late October. Some of the young people were unable to speak because of the drugs they'd been taking. I had a chat with a young man called Ricky, who Lorraine and Hester were reluctant to approach, as he's a bit rough sometimes. Ricky said the shelter should be painted in blue camouflage colours. He was fairly out of it, too.
A couple of Saturdays later, the Four Towns Bus was in Halesworth. This is a double-decker bus which travels around providing services for the youth and other local groups. Whe it was first acquired, I had the job of decorating the outside of the bus using coloured vinyl. On the Saturday night I went on the bus to meet Eric and Hannah who run the youth centre here. As always, they were most helpful and invited me to go to the youth club on any Monday or Wednesday evening, which I did, on two occasions. Later I went down to the park with Hannah to talk to the young people. It being Saturday, most of them were busy binge-drinking and smoking dope. They weren't very interested in drawing but it was nice to see them. Hannah struck up a conversation with one young man and explained about the project. She introduced me and the youth, who was fairly well gone, said "That's funny, there's a famous artist called Bob Linney who lives in Walpole". I felt somewhat flattered for a moment but then he said to me "Your voice sounds like a retarded twenty-one year old". I told him I was not retarded and certainly not twenty-one years old.
On my first visit to the youth centre, Eric was again very helpful but the young people there were pretty scatty. A group of boys and girls sat round a table with pens and paper that Eric had supplied. Mostly they were just writing their names in graffiti tag style. I asked if they ever drew pictures and they said that they didn't. One boy said he wouldn't do a drawing for the shelter but would just come and paint it when it was installed. I said no thanks as, without planning, it would probably look a mess and the people who used the shelter would have to look at it for years.
Several of the youth club members took pieces of the thick A3 paper, scribbled on them with thick felt-tip pens, scrunched the papers up and chucked them in the middle of the table before throwing their pens on the floor and shouting something vaguely obscene. They got through lots of paper but not many useable drawings emerged from this process. I asked Eric afterwards who cleaned up. "Oh, we do", he replied cheerfully, picking up discarded felt-tips and balls of paper.
Like the older ones in the park, this group showed little aptitude or desire to concentrate on drawing designs for the shelter. There was so much noise going on, too much happening, a big TV set turned up to full volume, somebody banging out of tune on an old piano, others throwing pool cues onto the floor, music blaring out of the sound system. A cacophany. Short little spans of attention, all a bit depressing. When I did a second session at the youth club, a week later, it was a bit calmer. Several young people drew 'tags' with felt-tip marker pens. This is definitely the favoured art style among the youngsters. Not sure how popular it is with the sub-committee...
I drew out black and white line-drawings based on two of the tags - Max and Logo. I used these two because they were not just boys' names but might also suggest other meanings. I also put together a design for the inside of the shelter, based on the drawings that the young people in the park had made. On Friday October 12, I went down to the park but the only two people there were Alan, one of the sub-committee members and Finn, a young skateboarder. I took the opportunity of showing them the drawings I had prepared and both approved of the approach re. art style. This was nice, as there had been some discussion about using a 'graffiti' style, some committee members wanting to avoid the use of the word 'graffiti', preferring 'alfresco art' or, at my suggestion, 'street art'.
The next night I went onto the Four Towns Bus again, and was interested to meet Duker, one of the rural community/youth workers. I also spoke to Hannah, who had helped paint the mural we did in Halesworth four years ago, and which has survived remarkably well. I showed the drawings to Hannah, Eric and another youth worker, Jackie. I explained my preference for the 'tag' art style and they thought it was a good idea, too.
Monday October 15 was the big day. Three men arrived from Rekk, the company that manufactures and supplies these youth shelters, and proceeded to install the shelter. A sort of short Nissan hut on legs, benches along either side, with open ends, made from aluminium, much of which had been 'powder-coated' to produce a dark green colour. Not the best base colour from my point of view, but still. The only other option had been dark blue. I went to the park the following day - installation was complete, the shelter's legs having been cemented in. While I was there Alastair, the chairman of our sub-committee, and the driving force behind the project, appeared and we chatted a bit. At the base of the two front legs of the shelter two names had been scratched into the concrete - it must have still been wet when the young people went down there on Monday night. One was 'Josh' and the other 'Hog'. Alastair complained a bit about this so, trying to be positive, I said something like "Well, man has been wanting to make marks like this ever since the first cave paintings". "Yes", replied Alastair, "I just rather hoped civilisation had moved on a bit since then". We chuckled.
The next day I went down to do some tests with different paints. I had been informed by the man at Rekk that "any acrylic paint will be fine". I had my doubts. The inside surface of the shelter was incredibly smooth, while the outside had a similar surface except that it was covered all over with moulded bumps in a regular pattern. One of the more difficult things I've had to paint, and I've painted most things by now. I dabbed on a bit of acrylic and let it dry. It stood up on the surface, almost inviting you to pick it off. I tried some emulsion, which was better but still far from perfect, so decide to use, for the most part, acetone-based spray paint, just like the graffiti artists use. The latter adhered really well. While I was doing this, I chatted to three sad boys who were sitting in the shelter. One, whose name I forget, although he had been at school with my daughter, had just moved back to Halesworth after splitting up with his girlfriend after two years' living together in Ipswich; and Ricky was there, feeling sorry for himself as he's got nowhere to live at the moment and has been sleeping rough, being woken up by unfriendly policemen in the middle of the night; and Jacob, who announced that he had just that morning been kicked off the course in motor mechanics that he'd been doing at Lowestoft College. A sad group, plenty of swearing and rolling of roll-ups.
On that Wednesday, I started getting into the painting properly. I'd hardly started before a member of the anti-youth dog walking brigade rushed to judgement. "What does that mean?", asked the woman, not making any effort to say hello or introduce herself in any way. Several thoughts went through my mind in quick succession. I didn't reply, as I felt I should be diplomatic. After all, I was a responsible citizen and represented the sub-committee of the Halesworth Crime Prevention Panel. I didn't want to get them a bad name. After a pause, I said "Good morning. Lovely morning, isn't it?" She then delivered a short monologue about the ills of today's youth. I said I thought it was our generation, not the youth, who were the vandals since we had created such a commercialised society blah blah blah.
Later, four or five young people came along and watched what I was doing. Lorraine came and so did Hannah, who brought her pet ferrets in a large cage. She took them out and let some of the others hold them, if they dared. Soon the young people were saying "Can I have a go?" Cayley and Jacob sprayed a star each after I had demonstrated. Lorraine also did a star. When we'd finished it was funny because the one I'd done was the worst, drippy.
The next day, Patrick and Josh helped to spray the mountains and other elements in the landscape. A few of the others showed some interest, but didn't actually summon up the energy to do anything practical. "What time will you be here tomorrow?", Patrick asked, enthusiastically. 'Things are looking uo', I thought to myself. Tomorrow was the first day of half term.
So, the young people of school age were off school. This was good because, broadly speaking, the young people who had left school were less inclined to get into the painting while those still at school had not yet developed the skills required for doing nothing for extended periods. Patrick arrived soon after I got there. Then came James, Jacob, Ben, Neil et al. We did the sun. I had decided to use a stencilling approach in an attempt to make the images look fairly neat and respectable. This involved cutting stencils in my studio and then taping them up against the shelter walls before spraying through the open areas. So we masked round the sun with a stencil and carefully sprayed it to produce a blend or gradation from yellow, through orange, to red. We did a few coats, as one of the adages of spraying is "It's better to do several thin coats than one heavy coat". In my experience, it's actually very difficult to apply a heavy coat without the paint running more than you want it to. It drips too much. A little drip is quite cool. Lots of drips just look like you don't know what you're doing.
As we peeled the stencil away, Jacob and Patrick, who had done most of the spraying got excited. It was great - the sun looked good. "That sun's fucking phat", exclaimed Patrick. "Fuck, that look good", Jacob said, putting his arm round Patrick's shoulder. A few minutes later, they asked if they could work for me. Full-time assistants, getting paid lots of money. "Fuck, that'd be cool", fantasised Jacob. Nice thought, though. Don't know how I'd cope with non-stop swearing.
The we did the river. I left most of this to the boys. Ben joined in and it was great to see them really getting into it. Ricky came along with his continuing tale of woe. He'd slept in the church with only the doormat as a blanket and was still shivering. He said that the police took his shoes away to check their sole-print against some prints found at a crime scene. Some of the shops in town had been burgled, including, confusingly, the shoe shop. Ricky was a suspect mainly because he had been caught, a few weeks back, after stealing a load of alcohol from the local supermarket. Apparently, one night he'd staggerred down to the park carrying a massive box full of all sorts of goodies - beer, vodka, alcopops. He'd been generous with it, and the young people had had a bit of a party down there. A community of sorts. Ricky was supposed to appear on bail in Lowestoft that day. I said he'd better go otherwise it would all get worse for him. "I don't want to spend my last fiver getting a fucking train to Lowestoft. I've had enough", he said, being tough but very upset. He said he might go up to see his aunt in Yarmouth. She's a heroin addict. He could get an overdose from her and commit suicide. He's come off heroin fairly recently - to prove it he showed me several pin pricks in his arms. "Do you want to see my groin?". he asked me. "No thanks, I believe you", I replied.
At the weekend, I worked in the studio preparing stencils, still for the landscape image on the inside of the shelter. It's amazing how much longer everything takes when you work on a large scale. After a morning's work, I'd look at what I'd done - maybe drawn up half of one side. Big is slow. Remember that, all you budding community artists. Very slow. This was the bit with large fly agaric mushrooms, snow-capped mountains and Tibetanish clouds. In my mind it was the Jianjinshan or Snowy Mountains of western Sichuan, over which Mao and his depleted troops struggled on the Long March - I've recently been reading a book about the LM. Nice to be drawing these simple shapes in the warmth of the studio listening to Gypsy Jazz, trying not to put my back out of joint bending, kneeling, stretching to draw it correctly, getting the lines to have some grace and style.
I went down to the park on the Monday morning - October 22, 2007. It was too damp to do any painting. A bit of unimaginative real graffiti had been added to the image over the weekend. Someone called Conor and another called Chopper had written their names in rather babyish, uninteresting lettering over the urban clouds that we had sprayed so carefully with their blends from red to yellow to white. More or less impossible to correct without starting again. I was a bit disappointed but, later in the day, when things had dried out a bit, happiness returned as several boys and girls worked enthusiastically on the image. The girls, Cayley and Ellie, actually said that they'd cleaned off as much as possible of the crappy 'graffiti' yesterday, which explained why it looked so faint. That made it feel much better for me. It seems that most of the young people thought the 'graffiti' was crap. Chopper turns out to be a boy I know reasonably well and Conor is his mate Conor. Harmless pratts, really. Small town not very tough tough guys.
Ricky turned up, still alive. Actually, I'd been quite worried about him. He was much happier and said that he's got the chance of a flat. Later, Jacky, the Community Support Officer came down to tell Ricky that he's not allowed to sleep in the church. While she was there, Jacky offerred him some not very friendly advice like "Get a life" and "Get a job". Afterwards, Ricky commented wryly that she had not exactly offerred him much 'Community Support'.
Tuesday was a cold, bright day but again condensation was a problem to begin with. I corrected a stem of one of the mushrooms and later we were able to get on better. Ben worked hard with me all day and it was good to get to know him a bit. Working with someone is one of the best ways to get to know them, I think. Several others also did a bit - a girl called Charlie, Jacob, Patrick. Max, who had drawn the original Max tag at the youth club came down and was impressed with the coloured version of Max that I showed him as a computer printout. He didn't get involved, though.
There's an older bloke who spends time down at the skatepark, maybe in his late forties. Whenever I, or any of the youth workers, appear he melts into the background and wanders off. Lorraine and Hester have never really managed to engage him in conversation. The general suspicion is that he sells drugs to the young people but I don't know. Anyway, he strolls around with his Doberman dog. The dog wears a muzzle and the man doesn't say much. One day, he and I were the only two people down there, so I thought I'd have a go at a conversation. "Hi, nice dog. What's his name?", I asked. I was a bit freaked out when he replied "Max". I said something about painting the Max tag on the shelter. "That's a coincidence", added the man and then melted away again, leaving me feeling a bit odd.
We did the sun's rays, which meant climbing up and down the stepladder and standing on wobbly benches holding on to the end, spray can in hand. Patrick and Ben did most work on it - 16 year olds. They constantly play 'music' on their mobile phones and are particularly enthralled by a song that teaches the listener to 'suck dick'. It has charming lyrics, like "Do your girlfriend's teeth get in the way?" at which the lads usually roar with laughter. The young people seem to swear an awful lot. They shout a lot, too. Jacob's amongst the loudest and specialises in shouting things like "What ho, old boy" at the top of his voice whenever frightened looking OAPs come within range.
On Wednesday Patrick, Ben, Liam and George did most of the work with several others hanging around. Ricky turned up to report that his meeting with the potential landlord, and other guy with whom he'd be sharing, had been disastrous.The other lodger, apparently a woman-beater by repute, didn't want Ricky staying there, so Ricky had to sleep rough again. Someone from the church bought him a meal of fish and chips at lunchtime. "I've had enough", he said again. "I might just go and hang myself". He'd been to the surgery in the morning but his doctor had not been there. I asked him why he wanted to see the doctor. "'Cos of all these thoughts going round in my head, man".
The work went well, although I discovered that one of the older boys had chucked a can of spray paint into the nearby river without me seeing. Jacob was there again, although he didn't do much work. He announced in a loud voice that one of the smaller boys, George had "lost his anal virginity". I hadn't heard that one before. Lots more swearing but a good working atmosphere. My friend Julia, walking her dog Miff in the park came over to have a chat and a look at the shelter.
Started Thursday by doing a small cloud with George. Soon a group of 12 year old girls came by. I knew three of them quite well and they each had a go at spraying a bit on the cityscape - Nancy, Freda, Matilda, Freya and Eleanor. I added some details on the buildings. Later, a man came and made some comments about the shelter. He was carrying a Guardian newspaper, which I usually take as a promising sign. "So now they'll have somewhere comfortable to do their binge drinking" was his opening, and somewhat disappointing, remark. He went on to predict that the painting wouldn't last long before it was spoiled by graffiti. I pointed out that the mural in the underpass had lasted for about four years without being seriously disfigured and added that I thought that most of the young people here are fine and not a threat to society. He complained about the litter the young people leave. I said that the Crime Prevention Panel is planning to raise money so that a sturdy bin can be put next to the shelter. "They won't use it", he said, immediately. I think his glass is half empty.
I spent the weekend and Monday cutting stencils for the Max image and went to the park on Tuesday to make a start on painting it on the outside of the shelter. Ricky turned up, limping and on crutches. "What have you been up to?", I asked him. "I went to Bungay at the weekend and got shot in the leg", he replied. "Shit", I said, "Do people carry guns in Bungay?". "Oh no, I went round me mate's house on Saturday and we were messing around with his air rifle. He shot me in the leg by mistake. I had to go to hospital - they kept me in overnight". He showed me a small hole towards the top of his inside leg where the pellet had gone through his track suit bottoms". "That was close", I laughed. "Yeah, just a few inches higher it would've got me in the nuts". He'd enjoyed the warm bed.
On Wednesday a boy called Henry came and had a chat. He was the one who Lorraine had said was very interested in art/graphics and was supposed to be a good artist. The only thing of his that I'd seen was his representation of 'You Dickhead', which I referred to earlier. He asked if he and some of the others could paint the remaining side of the shelter. They didn't want to plan anything, just to be given some spray paint and allowed to get on with it. I said it would look a mess unless they planned it a bit. I also said that I didn't really want to buy the paint for that out of what I was getting paid. I thought it would be great, from an ownership point of view, if they did the remaining side, so tried to be as accomodating as possible. We made an agreement that if he produced a rough design before the next sub-committee meeting the following Tuesday, I would put it to the committee and recommend it. I gave him my phone number and said to give me a ring whenever he had prepared the sketch and I would come to Halesworth to collect it. I also asked why he hadn't shown any interest in the project before now and reminded him that I'd been down to the park regularly since June with art materials. He said he'd been busy. Very frustrating, actually, because, of course, the meeting came and went and Henry didn't re-appear.
Max started to take shape on Thursday. Not many young people down there, half-terms finished and my helpers are mostly back at school. Nevertheless, it was a lovely, bright autumn day and I'm up on the stepladder masking out when I become aware that there's someone else nearby. I looked round to my left to see a large man, maybe in his 60s, standing there shaking his head from side to side, as if tut-tutting. When I looked round, he said "That's terrible. Really bad. Really bad stuff" and then just walked off before I had taken it in. "Cheers, mate", I thought to myself, a bit shocked, "Now fuck off and read your Daily Mail". Not a very encouraging start to the day.
Later, the Guardian-carrying complainer returned, as well. He definitely sees the project's main aim as being to provide the young people with a comfortable place in which to drink copious quantities of alcohol. I pointed out that I thought part of the idea was to provide a focal point for the youth to gather so that they didn't congregate in other parts of the town, like near the war memorial or near peoples' houses. Philip (we were on first name terms by now) asked me a series of questions about how the park is policed, what the Crime Prevention Panel does, etc. I was as helpful as I could be but had to tell him that I was not really the person qualified to answer his enquiries. I was just the artist - don't shoot me nor the piano player. I told him I'd ask someone from the CPP to give him a ring, which they did later that evening.
On Friday, I carried on with Max. I had quite a long chat with PC Phillips who's got an arrest warrant for Ricky, who didn't go to court yesterday. I haven't seen Ricky since Monday. The PC also said, interestingly, that he's met Ricky's mum and that she appeared to be a perfectly nice lady. Ricky, on the other hand, has been ranting on about what an effing cow she is for not letting him stay at her house. Two sides to every story.
Later, I had a chat with Neil, who shambled up in his baggy trousers. One of the more wastery looking boys that hang out down there. This was the first decent conversation I'd had with Neil and I was pleased to discover that he has much more going for him than appears at first sight. He's doing an 'Access to Music' course in Norwich, for which he has to get up at 6.30 three mornings a week to get the bus. He told me that his class is currently studying Bob Dylan's 'Blowin' in the Wind', and learning about protest songs. I thought this was a good subject to be learning about. Worth getting up early for. We talked about the young people doing one side of the shelter and I showed him a book called 'Spraycan Art', pointing out illustrations of cool black graffiti dudes in New York sketching out their designs before starting to spray.
Oh yes, and going back to the policeman, he quite liked the tree on which the skaters have hung several dead skateboards. It looks good. I had a chat with Finn about Nina Simone's 'Strange Fruit", which was nice.
The following Monday was a damp day and as my daughter Jo was going back to Brighton , I decided not to go to the park. Instead, I made a start on the stencils for 'Logo', the design I have in mind for the last side of the shelter. On Tuesday I worked on Max. A woman came along with her poodle while I was working. I turned round to look at her, wondering what to expect, and she exclaimed, enthusiastically, "This is wonderful!". She looked around the inside and came out saying "It's lovely". I thanked her and said how encouraging it was to get such positive comments.
An older man with his greying dog approached, a bit later. "Comin' on, innit?", he observed cheerily. We had a chat during which I learnt that his father had never hit him or his siblings during his childhood. He nevertheless respected his father and always did what he was told. He said something favourable about David Cameron but quickly apologised - "I don't want to get political". After pointing out the importance of the traditional family he took his dog off for a shit on the Millennium Meadow. A little while later, Stephen, who used to run the Dunwich Ship pub, came along. "You're not Banksie, are you?" I was quite impressed that he knew who Banksie was.
I then chatted with Rob, the local dealer, and Hogwart. Rob phoned Henry to see if he'd done the design yet, because the meeting is about two hours away. He'd done nothing - no change there, then. Rob and Hog were happy about the way the designs were coming along, although they didn't offer to do any work on it.
I went to the meeting that afternoon, where I received a vote of thanks for working successfully "under difficult conditions". One of the committee members said "It's an object lesson watching the way Bob relates to the young people", so I was pleased. I said we should try vinyl for the Awards for All logo, although Steve, another committee member, thought it would be peeled off straight away. I said lets try the cut vinyl - I can get two copies done at cost price and if, in the end, they're damaged, we can think of something more permanent. I've also got to get permission from the kids/parents in the photos I took, so that they can be used as publicity.
On Wednesday I spent a cold day painting Max. Getting to the end, just adding highlights and finishing touches. Several complimentary comments from passers by. One man came up and said "Graffiti artists don't usually take so much trouble over their work". I had a chat with another man who had a stammer. We talked briefly about 'ownership', although none of the young people were able to help today. As he went off, he said "Well, it's g-g-g-great what you're d-d-d-doing". Later, Finn, Rob and Hog moved the dead skateboards to another tree, in case one fell on someone walking along the path underneath the tree.
I put the final touches to Max on Thursday, then spent the following weekend preparing stencils for the last side which is based on the word 'Logo', one of the tags done at the youth club. After a short holiday in Venice, I went down to the park on Thursday but it was too wet to do anything. The next day was bright and sunny but even at 1.30 p.m. there was a heavy layer of condensation on the shelter, so again I did no painting.
Saturday was a dry day, for once, although I still had to wipe off some condensation at around 12.30. Managed to do the first big stencil for Logo - blue background using the groovy 'Montana' paints, which are really nice to use. Two girls, Olivia and Sally helped with some spraying. Patrick, Jacob, Hogwart and a few others were down there rolling joints and generally having a laugh. Patrick also did quite a lot of spraying. He and Jacob, at one point, climbed onto the childrens' play equipment and did some really cool stoned scat singing. Very musical - actually, Jacob plays drums.
Despite forecasts of heavy rain for Monday from three different websites (BBC Weather; the Met Office; UK Weather), we had no rain, so I was able to do a couple of hours painting on Logo. Westley, Maria, Jacob and Hogwart were in the shelter. Wes and Maria had been to court this morning re. the fight in Halesworth several weeks ago. As it turned out, all charges against them were dropped. Wes was much relieved, as he would have got a prison sentence if found guilty. He was celebrating with a box of twenty Carlsberg Export beers. He offered me one but I declined, mainly because I wasn't feeling too good with 'man-flu'.
I did the L and O backgrounds. Alan came along with his dog Jasper and told me that the commissioning ceremony would be at 10.00 a.m. on December 5. This means that I've got a bit more time than I thought, which is good, in view of the inclement weather. Wes went off to get a kebab and left the half-full box of Carlsberg Exports under a bush in the park, telling Jacob and Hogwart to look after it. As I was leaving, they were also leaving the park, carrying Westley's beers. I was just getting in the car when I noticed Jacob, Hog and another boy coming up the lane, Jacob in the lead. He suddenly turned round and said something to the boy carrying the beers, who immediately put the box down behind a clump of weeds, hiding them from view. Next, a police van approached and the driver wound down the window and had a word with Jacob, who told me later that the policeman had said "Don't get run over - it makes too much paperwork for us".
Wednesday was a nice morning after yesterday's rain. I continued with Logo on my own. The only people I chatted to were Alan (and Jasper) and Josh. Alan talked about various things while I applied a stencil. Regarding litter, he said "The only things I really object to are broken bottles and vomit". I said "The two things go together, don't they". Josh is a pleasant, laid back boy who is hoping to study catering at the new college which used to be the local Middle School. I know Josh's dad, who is called Keon Joy. I wondered what Josh's surname was - he lives with his mum, the parents being separated. It could have been Josh Joy. I finished the G and one of the Os, again impressed with the nice colours in the Montana Gold range of spraypaints.
Later, I e-mailed Steve to tell him that the lottery logo can't be done in vinyl after all. The lettering is to small for the cutter at EPS Transfers to handle. We'll have to get by with the metal plaque supplied by the Lottery people. I'll mount it on wood and it can be held up by someone when photos are taken at the opening ceremony.
On Friday, I only managed about an hour painting before a hail and sleet storm forced me to stop. The following Monday, I finished painting Logo and stencilled an additional figure onto the empty area of the landscape on the inside of the shelter. Had a chat with an 80 year old gentleman who had been a senior local government officer (Superintendent General) in Hitchin.
For me, that was about it. The commissioning ceremony took place on a very rainy morning in the park. None of the young people who might use the shelter were in attendance - presumably, nobody had thought to invite them. There was no shortage of people from various civic and police bodies, on the other hand. I had seen only one or two of them in the park before. They had their tea and biscuits in the shelter and had their photograph taken in the rain. A few journalists braved the weather and interviewed some of us who had been involved. On the Friday of that week, we made the front page of the Beccles and Bungay Journal, with a large colour photo of people standing in front of the shelter and quite a good article entitled 'Shelter From The Storm'. It reminded me that there are still a couple of small jobs to complete at some point - "Bob now wants to cover the shelter in a transparent anti-gravity coating, and also plans to add some glow-in-the-dark stars on the inside of the roof". I had mentioned anti-graffiti paint to the young reporter, but I quite like the idea of anti-gravity paint. I have nice visions of Patrick, Jacob, Finn, Hogwart, Josh, Wes, Ricky and crew floating away, stoned, swearing, arguing, drinking beer, shouting and laughing.....
