“Here it is,” the man said.
There it was. We both looked it. It was a boat. It floated and all.

“It’s been in some fires, that’s why it’s black there,” he said.
“How many fires?” I asked.
“A few, that’s why the metal is warped too.”
“But it goes?”

“I redid the engine completely, I put my own mechanics in there. It goes great.”
“So it can get me to London?”
“One or two days and you will be in London.”
I nodded slowly.
“I’ve got twenty minutes before I’m going to work,” the man said, “I can show you how to drive and tell you everything about boats.”

It was hard grey metal on the outside and long and half painted, more of a barge. On the inside it was the same but marginally nicer as it hadn’t been exposed to the elements except for the living habits of its numerous owners over the years. It had some leaks and there were lots of spiders in its crevices, but it’s a good thing spiders only matter if you see them.

The choice should have been obvious. Even most animals would have made the right call, instinctually sensing danger and backing away. But for whatever reason, I simply remember saying in a dumb voice, “Let’s do it.”

I was a few miles downstream and had been sailing as brilliantly as a first-time boater could. I navigated locks, I didn’t smash into oncoming or parked boats, and I even waved at other boaters as I passed and said, “Lovely day, isn’t it?”

It had all led me to this, to where I was now, listening to the last pathetic gurgle of the engine as it died unheroically. It was dusk and I had decided to call it a day, after I’d gotten through the half mile single lane tunnel that is. This is where my engine dies, in that tunnel. It’s where I die too, inside, my soul.

It was pitch black, no light except for the tiny circle ahead, and the only sounds were drops of water landing into the canal from the tunnel walls.

I allowed a good minute to feel sorry for myself, but that quickly got old because it was cold and scary in there. The only way forward was off the sides of the wall, so I used a pole to push, left side then right side, zigzagging.

Three hundred quid a month, that was the deal. I hadn’t luck finding accommodation anywhere else in the city, so the idea of living on the canals in a dilapidated fixer upper sounded plain magnificent.

The boat was in Pewsey. I agreed to pick it up to drive back to London. The man had met me at the train station and we walked for an hour through bush and muddy canal path to get to his boat. It was raining and I had all my luggage with me, but I had come too far to be deterred or anything other than enthusiastic for all of it.

When I finally came out of the tunnel, I found myself in a swamp of overgrown weeds and stinging nettles. I gave a final hard push to get me to the bank. There was another boat moored just up ahead. I did not think I would hit the other boat, but I had only known boats for a day and there is a concept known as momentum.

The man smiled and grabbed a long stick from his boat. He jumped over to my boat and as he passed, I smelt spliff and something else. He leant his back against the boat and used his stick to push off the bottom of the canal. The boat slowly came angling back.

“Metal, is shite. It’s not right. This,” and he held the stick up, “this is a tool. Tools are there to make your life easier. It isn’t anything other than that. It’s a tool. Where is your stick?”
I picked up the short metal pipe left for me.
“It’s hollow, there is your problem already. And it’s metal, it’s shite. Wood though, wood is your friend. Wood gets better with age. Wood is, it’s reliable, it’s dependable.”
We watched the boat rock back into place.

“I’m Benj.”
“Jay, nice to meet you, and thank you for all this.”
“You’re from South Africa.”
“Australia.”
His face scrunched because I should have been from where he guessed, “What are you doing out here then?”
“I’m not sure.”
“What do you mean?”
“I haven’t figured it out yet.”
“What you mean you haven’t figured it out?”
“To work, to live. I don’t know yet.”

He pulled out his spliff, “So you just thought you’d come out here, into the canal, to what, to have a good time?”
“I came because it was something different.”
“You what?”
“Something different.”
“But why are you here?”
“In this position right here, or in the country?”

Benj had some spliff and the boat finally hit the bank, but he was in no rush. He had been smoking a lot of spliff. He said he’d had a hard day that was why he was smoking so much spliff.

“Nine years I’ve lived here. I got no engine on my boat, how do I do it? Compassion, that’s how. You just take your time. Your engine died. You know anything about engines?”
I shook my head and he scoffed.
“You think I’m being rude?” he studied my face, “I’m just teaching you, so once you know it, you can know it for life.”

It was well dark by the time we moored. Benj got a fire going on the bank and I joined him because he asked me to. He went back inside his boat. He came out a few minutes later with a machete. Everything else was dark, but if there was one thing I could see it was the reflection of the moon on that machete. It shone so brilliantly it was ethereal.

He walked up to me and held it firmly in his hand.
“See this?”
I nodded, seeing it.
“And what is it?”
“It’s a machete,” I said.
Benj shook his head and clenched his teeth, “No. Well, yes, it is. But no. What is it?”
He looked admiringly at the blade, a lusty glint in his eyes, “It’s a tool. It’s supposed to make life easier.”

We stood by Benj’s fire and smoked his spliff and Benj talked. He was talking a lot.
“I made this myself,” he pointed to the fireplace, “I’m not telling you how I did it, but it’s all sustainable. All the materials I found, scrap metal. It’s all you need man.”
He gave me some spliff.
“Just finish that one,” he said, and I did.

I was not feeling the effects of the spliff because I didn’t care about it. I was smoking without thinking, dragging in because there wasn’t anything else to do.

Benj went back inside his boat and brought out his kettle and some pasta and coffee.
“You’re going to drink coffee now and then just sleep?”
“I’ll do what I want.”
We smoked more spliff.

“So you hired this boat off this guy so you could drive it to London?”
“To live in the canals.”
Benj scoffed and motioned at the boat, “And this is what he gave you?”
I nodded.
“You want to survive on this canal? Don’t be stupid.”
I merely smoked the spliff and didn’t say anything.
“Don’t just come out here expecting people to save you. What if I wasn’t here? You’d be done. What did you expect?”
I got closer to the fire.
“This means you’re just relying on other people. It’s why I’ve got nothing. I’m always helping other people, like you. I’m giving all the time, and I have nothing.”

Every time he finished a statement, he would begin his next as if the previous never existed, like he was talking again for the first time.

“So go on,” he suddenly turned to me, “what have you learnt?”
I looked at him.
“What have you learnt, in your life? Tell me.”
I looked at him still.
“I’ve told and taught you so much already. Everything, all this around you, is me. Tell me, tell me what you’ve learnt. Tell me something about yourself.”

I looked away and smoked the spliff. I didn’t say anything for a while because I needed to think. Benj stared back at the fire. I was thinking very hard about what to say but I couldn’t think of anything.

A long time passed and we were still quiet.
“Want another?” Benj motioned at the spliff.
“Sure.”
Benj went back into his boat and I stayed outside thinking. I was still thinking about what I could say, what I had learnt, who I was. I looked into the fire and realised for the second time I had nothing.

He came out with the spliff and started smoking more.
“I’m going to bed Benj,” I said as confidentially as I could, “thanks for everything.”
Benj looked at me in his fascinated way, “Well,” he stuck out his hand, “thanks Jay from Australia.”
“No, thank you.”
“No no, thank you,” he shook hard, “I told you everything about myself, and then I asked you to tell me something about you, and you said nothing. So thanks, thanks for that.”

Benj’s boat was gone in the morning. The phone call with my boat man was underwhelming. He made no apologies. He was back in Poland until the end of the month and wouldn’t be refunding until then.

I had also already given him a one-thousand-two-hundred-pound deposit. I had his boat and his thick wheeled electric bike which was his baby. There was no contract or paperwork, just words and a handshake. It was a dodgy deal, but I had been traveling alone for a while and felt I was ready to trust someone, and this fairly untrustworthy fellow seemed adequate.

My only option was to wait a month for him to return and give my deposit back. I surveyed my surroundings. There was no reception, no running water, lots of mud, and no life apart from the cows on the hobby farm next door, but even they preferred to hang on the other side of their paddock where it wasn’t as dismal. They did like to come over here for a shit though. This would be me for the month.

I remember thinking ‘fuck’ and then I remember saying it.
‘Fuck.’

I eventually came to a lock near Crofton. The stretch between locks was only two hundred metres or so, but from where I was on the canal, it seemed like a place of pure magic.

There were no trees blocking the light so the boats were covered in rays and the canal too, changing its colour from the dark mugged green I was used to seeing to a vibrant emerald.  There were ten or so boats moored against concrete and they were living boats, ornate spectacles with every comfort imaginable, like someone dumped a Victorian palace on floaties.

There were concrete mooring poles too and concrete paths connecting them, so you didn’t have to clean your feet every time you got on and off your boat. It was luxury and it was beautiful. I walked along the path and nodded at the boaters while admiring their pieces.

The embankment was there, only it was blocked off by a barbed wire fence. There was however a small stream which ran alongside the canal. It was making that clean, crisp freshwater sound.

A farmer was working his crop on the other side of the stream.
“Is the water clean?” I asked.
“Well,” he said leaning on his spade, “the dog drinks it.”
He pointed to the healthy looking old boy watching the grass intensely. Aside from our being different species, it was as good an indicator as any.
“If it’s good enough for your dog it’s good enough for me.”
“It is good water. I don’t connect up with the canal at all. That there is good water, bloody cold though.”
He had not finished talking when I started stripping to my undies. He just watched, completely unphased, then he picked his spade up again and started working.

I stepped into the stream and lay down, letting the water run over me. It wasn’t too comfortable with all those rocks and pebbles, but I didn’t care, nor did I care for the bugs or leeches attaching to me. I just lay for a while.

Soon a man from the top of the canal came and sat down with me. He was sweating and red. He had been hiking all day. He said it was a damn good idea, this one I had to lay in the stream, and he said when he first moored here a few days ago he had the same idea, although he didn’t know if the water was clean.
“Well,” I said doubtfully, “it’s most likely clean.”
He scooped a handful of water and let it run down to his wrists and back in the stream, “Looks clean, doesn’t it?”

The next day I started work in the packing room of Rob and his business partner Tom’s office. It took me a few minutes to figure out the first few holders. Once I did that, I could do them without thinking. Then, I just had to repeat the process two thousand times to get the first batch out. I thought it best not to count.

But it wasn’t that monotonous. Rob and Tom would come down every hour or so and talk garbage for fifteen minutes. It was always nice hearing their footsteps down the stairs and knowing Rob had just watched a dumb YouTube video and wanted to share it.

Rob would also come down for a fag just as regularly. He’d smoke it from outside the office but still be poking his head inside so we could converse. Then Tom would come down, “Rob for Christ’s sake, stop breathing your smoke in here. What’s the point of going outside if you’re just going to breathe the smoke back in?!”
Rob would just look at him and puff. He would eventually move away, in his own time.

The boat was cold at night. To counteract it, I would get in bed very early and read for a while. By the time that was over, the blankets had warmed and there was an insulation I had made in the little surface area between my body and the blanket. I woke sweating in the mornings, but I knew as soon as I left the insular space I would not be able to return and I would be cold again, so I usually stayed in bed for a while in the morning too.

You really do forget you’re on water. Occasionally you’re reminded when there is one of those subtle cracking sounds water and metal bring on randomly, or when another boater passes and creates a wave to rock you.

But the work was fine. When eight came around I would walk up to the crossroads. I would wait for the red van and when it came, I would put my thumb out and Rob would pick me up. Rob was a well lived in man. When he was sixteen, he had gone to India to get his spirituality, training under a yogi there.

“They have all these street markets and street shops right,” he told me, “and people sell everything, and I mean everything. There was this man selling second hand false teeth. They were right there on the street. People would come up, pick up some pairs, put them in their mouths to try and then put them back, trying to find the best fitting pair.”

“There was also this bloke cleaning ears. He was on the side of the road and he was cleaning ears. I thought why not, so I sat down next to him and he gave me the run down, the works. After wood, I swear I tell you, I never heard clearer in my life.”

“I was on this bus yeah, and it was packed, man it was packed. And we pulled up at the next stop and this guy was there with a wheelchair. He had no legs, just arms and his wheelchair. He was a little bloke. The bus doors opened and this guy climbed out his wheelchair. Then the bus driver roight, comes out and picks him up. I was close to the door, so he just hands the guy to me. ‘Hold,’ he said. He plonks him in my arms and jumps back in his seat. So I’m there with this poor fully grown bloke with no legs, but his arms wrapped around me like a baby. He was just looking at me while I held him. It was mental.”

Sometimes Rob and Tom would come down from their office and just pat me on the back, “Jay, you’re the best in the world at assembling these holders. There’s nobody better, nobody more experienced with these things.”
It felt good to be the best in the world at something.

Unlike his smoking compadre, Tom was on a health kick. He was at the gym every day and he said his knee was sore one morning.
“This right knee, been bugging me on and off for months.”
Rob piped up, “See this,” he said flexing and extending his leg, “look at that, perfect. Never had any issues with it. And you know what I do for exercise? Nothing, absolutely nothing.”
“I did burpees this morning,” Tom said ignoring Rob as he normally did, “I think that’s what did it.”
“What’s a burpee?” Rob asked.
We looked at him and laughed.
“No really,” he said, “never heard of it.”
Tom demonstrated a burpee and Rob just watched, a fag hanging out of his mouth and the corner of his lip raised.
“What the fuck was that?” he said, “that looks stupid as fuck.”

Tom told me I distract Rob because Rob, he believed, was what they call a child. When focused, he could punch out work and get things done like nothing you ever saw, but you had to keep him focused. He was also just as capable as doing jack for weeks at time, and this magically coincided with the weeks I had been spending there.

“When you first meet Rob, you think he’s just some geezer,” Tom said. “Then you actually get speaking with him, and you realise he knows more about sustainability than anyone you’ve ever met.”
Rob too spoke affectionately about Tom.
“Tom is a prick. But everyone needs a prick, don’t they? I use him, the prick.”

Tom was from old school English lineage with relatives in high places and castles. Rob loved to make fun of the way Tom mentioned what school he went to and who he’d known back from his days at Oxford or Cambridge or Eton or wherever. Tom told him to fuck off when he did, but telling Rob to fuck off was a futile enterprise.

There was a time when I moored the boat too tightly and the water changed levels. I came back in the afternoon to a slanted boat. The water had dropped to such a degree half the boat closest to the bank was sitting on the canal floor. So for two nights, I just slept on a tilt, waking every few hour or so on the floor, then climbing back on the mattress again.