Ladhope

The snow is on its way, in a fortnight a Galashiels local told. On a positive thought, I managed to purchase a warm wool cardigan from a charity shop. I am a hardy soul but I am almost 49 years old and in hindsight of what I endured during my life, I should be thinking about rehousing myself, admit these process crippling anxieties that illude ingenuity. The wind chill is definitely minus but my body temperature seems to be coping with the icy nip. Woken at 5 am by dog walkers but if I pack away now, I”ll be walking, shivering through the coldest hours of the dawn.

I’ve found it hard to remember to take. my pills to prevent Lyme disease, missing doses, mostly. during the evening, my mental health has been deteriorating, guess this is why I have been drinking to tame the hyper vigilance before my mind breaks when I should be prioritising anticipation of the coming cold. I have warming memories of the folk of Galashiels, my heart will be sore to leave this town. I am planning on travelling again today. I have been feeling things crawling around in my ears, but I suspect this is psychosomatic after throwing numerous earwigs out of my tent during the last few early mornings and late evenings. I am looking forward and being motivated to rise from my tent by anticipation of a warm roll and hot coffee I could purchase in town. It’s most strange to perceive kindness from inanimate objects, I guess from a dilapidated state of soulless dejection.

In a way writing this blog about myself feels selfish and self-centred, but usually, emerged in the deep depths of this isolated and objectified disparity I have little else if nothing else to write about. Packing up my tent, notably pulling out the tent poles burned my hesitant hands with sticky cold, my tent was frozen, and the material folded as if it were cardboard. The walk down the Brae was warming, and I found the bakery friendly, although the younger member of the bakery could not empathise with the predicament; I watched closely to find a sign of autism but only found Neo-liberal conditioning. Coffee and rolls are of good quality here and save my stiff fingers from precariously tumbling around a hot gas stove.

I prefer wild indigenous flowers. This purple toadflax is bonnie among the crumbling brickwork of a redundant factory.

A walk down the road revealed a recharge cafe, curiosity curtailed inside to see the recycling of food waste. A posh squat cafe I thought.

Inside the cafe, I got to wash all the soiled clothes at the bottom of my rucksack which means now I have a clean pair of warmer socks. Happy to say I am leaving this cafe stuffed, food was delicious and the people volunteering are helpful.

I choose to walk mountains, to hitchhike locations of outstanding natural beauty rather than curl up inebriated inside pissy shop doorways; yet these predicaments are visible to only a fraction of society. Today I phoned the Borders council homeless team, I am not very optimistic about a positive outcome, and having given them my details to await a callback, I read the list of discriminative criteria displayed on their website.

To be eligible for a homeless service, you must be able to show that you:

• are homeless
• are not intentionally homeless
• are unable to remain in your home due to domestic abuse, medical, financial, overcrowding or any other significant reason
• have a local connection

There is an option of private rented accommodation, I will explore those possibilities.

I also booked myself in for an eye test but this isn’t happening till next week, as I am having to pull objects back at length to focus on them. I have set my phone alarm to go off three days earlier to remind me every day that I need to be back in Galashiels for the eyesight OTC test. A man named Andrew Stewart returned a call from the borders council, how weird that my previous council officer was named Alan Stewart. They seem to be in the mind of assisting me in returning to Cornwall, and liaising reconnection with the council there. Am not keen on returning to Cornwall, after spending 18 months there driven out of my distraught mind with disturbing unease of outright loneliness.

I returned to the Borders council at 2 pm and found they have temporarily housed me in emergency accommodation in Galashiels. This must be so insulting to my ancestry, who held Scotland’s longest occupied residential house, for over nine hundred years; how times have changed. The guy who was interviewing me about an emergency loan was expressing his doubts to me that I would be rehoused. He admitted that the decision was not up to him as he quizzed me about what I had and how I spent my money since Monday. I’ve figured out the central heating and changed a bulb around so I have got some lighting in the lounge.

I got the loan, which was £40 then he rang back and said he’d made a mistake and in fact, it was £80; felt as if he was playing head games, they know I have been diagnosed with BPD. The money came through via a text message which could be cashed at any PayPoint. I purchased a pint with my last £5 and sat with some locals until 8 pm, then. got to take away, and fell asleep after eating.