Beware Pagans...

At last there is light. So much so that I’m tempted to put my sunglasses on when I’m at my desk for certain times of day. I’m at risk of being blinded. It has to be a health and safety issue. But I don’t really mind. Because, as long as I don’t venture outside, I can bask in the sun, stretching out my feet like a cat, and pretend that it’s almost summer, and I’m almost warm.

It looks like I’m not the only one with this kind of thinking. I’ve seen a few people tricked into wearing shorts, flippy skirts, bare legs and sandals. There’s a more sensible man leaning against a wall outside. It’s the end wall of a terrace, and he stand beneath a wall-mounted street light, head raised to the sun and looking like he’s about to indulge in a pagan ritual. He’s smart enough to do it whilst wearing a sheepskin jacket with a heavy beard to keep his face warm. Although now I think about it, judging by the amount of laundry he’s just picked up from the laundromat in his supermarket trolley, I’m wondering if that’s as much because he didn’t have enough clean clothes as anything else.

I do feel that I should brave the cold and offer him a warning though. The last man I saw leaning against that wall was facing the other way and searching for relief from things other than the cold. If the trickle he left running from the wall to the gutter was anything to go by, he wasn’t worshipping the sun. South London: workplace, temple and toilet, all rolled into one handy location. How convenient.