Mudlark

I go down to the river when the tide is out, which today was early, so I was on the mud before it was properly light. The mud is cold in a way that gets into your feet and stays there for hours after. You stop feeling your toes pretty quick. I have learned not to think about my feet. If you think about your feet all morning the morning takes twice as long.

What I do is I look for things in the mud that I can sell. Bits of coal that fall off the boats. Old rope, even a short bit, the rope-makers will buy it back. Nails. Bits of iron. A good day is when you find a lump of coal big as your fist, because that is money, real money, and you can feel the weight of it in your hand and you already know what it is worth before you have even washed it off.

I found two lumps like that today. I want to say that first because it matters. Two good lumps.

Most of what is in my head while I work is just sums. How much is this worth, how much do I have so far, how much more before I can stop and eat. People think you must have big thoughts when you are alone all morning but you do not. You think about money and you think about food and that is mostly it.

For food it is bread. It is always bread. I used to think about other things on it. Butter, or a bit of dripping, or jam one time I saw in a shop window all red in a jar. But I do not think about those anymore. There is no use in it. It just makes the bread feel worse. So now when I buy my bread I only think about the bread, and I am glad of the bread, and I do not let my head go to the jam. That is a thing you learn. You learn to want exactly what you can have and nothing past it. You are not hungry for things on top of being hungry.

I see the fine houses up from the river when I carry my findings to sell. You can tell the ones with money because there is smoke coming out the chimneys all day long, not just a little, all day, like they have so much coal they do not even count it. I sell my two lumps for pennies and they burn a whole river of it just to sit warm in a room. I do not feel anger about it really. It is just how it is. But I do notice it. I notice who is warm.

Here is the good part of today. With the two good lumps I had more than usual, so after I bought my bread I had a half-penny still, and there was a man selling hot potatoes from a can. I bought one. I did not even eat it straight away. I just held it in both my hands because they were so cold from the mud, and the potato was hot through the skin, and I stood there and held it and let my hands come back to life. That was the best part. Not even the eating. The holding it.

Then I ate it and it was good, and I had my bread still for later, and I thought, that was a good day. Two lumps and a hot potato in my hands. I will remember that the next time the tide is out before light and the mud is cold.