Manchester's Middle Class Is Sleeping on the Streets

If homeless charity Crisis is to be trusted (and if you can't trust a homeless charity, who can you trust?) it seems that things are about to get pretty al dente for the middle class here in England. The shocking news that "the middle classes could be forced to live on the streets within years" came to my attention when the ever-accurate and eternally understated Daily Mail legally appropriated an article by hysterical Socialist samizdat the Guardian (they read it so you don't have to). The report revealed… well, I don't know what the report actually said, because the Mail decided to avoid any direct reference to it (they don't read it because it's not important).

The gist of it was this: Soon, Britain's middle class will be sleeping on the streets. Shaken to my very core, I took to the marbled pavements of Manchester to hear what REAL people had to say about this undemocratic disaster.

I found Billy, a real person like you and I, shopping for his groceries in Harvey Nichols. He showed the kind of compassion that a cold-hearted journalist like myself would never be able to comprehend.

"What would be the worst thing about being a homeless?" I asked him.

"I think if you're homeless, you're in despair," replied Billy. "You're in a place where you've got nobody. I couldn't live without a little contentment in my life."

"What's that in your basket?"

"Persian candy floss."

"Is that what you mean by a little contentment?"

"Well it's certainly one way of turning me into a happy camper."

Moved to tears by Billy's impassioned outburst, it only felt right to discover how the horrors of homelessness can be avoided. Meet Marie, une parfumiere. Knowledgeable that the scent of a tramp can leave little to the imagination concerning toiletry habits, she recommended a classic cologne, such as Dior 'Au Sauvage', without irony, or this Acqua di Palma – which smells like lemon Jif – to cover up any unfortunate odors. At a modest $155 for the bottle, it'll make you smell more Prince than piss.

Next up on our fact-finding mission to prepare the middle class from imminent social exclusion, we hit up the M&S wine aisle. This is where we met Rob Fahey, a man so middle class his favorite musician is Moby and he counts thespians and seamstresses amongst his closest friends -- a man so lost in the social ladder that both his parents bestowed him with heraldry. Prophetically, he's homeless.

We chatted about the Beajoulais Nouveau soon to arrive in the shops. We discussed the pitfalls of not owning a bottle opener despite maintaining a penchant for fine wines. He took me to his "domicile" and showed off the fine Chinese silk lining of his jacket.

"It was bought for me by my good friend, Freida Masalisky. She was a wonderful seamstress in her day. Oh, we used to party. She would design garments for the Palace Theatre, Covent Garden. Those were the days."

"So what happened?"

"Well Samuel, I like a drink. Do you like a drink?"

"Within reason."

"Oh, we didn't care back then. We'd travel from party to pub and back to party."

I asked him what it's like to be middle class and on the streets. In typical middle English fashion he voiced his feelings through a letter, too reserved and gentrified to speak.

I, like any proper journalist, have not read the report from the Crisis survey because, as you know, stories are far more interesting when they're built upon pithy anecdotes rather than facts. It's shocking tales like Rob's that prove that middle class homelessness isn't a possibility -- it's a reality. Deeply saddened by this, I went to HMV to pick up a Moby CD for my new friend, partly to remind him of what he might be capable of were he to rehabilitate himself back into acceptable society. Alas, he had left, probably due to "prior commitments."