Theres the polished asphalt, closed off by men in reflective wastecoats, permitting an uninhibited stroll across territory usually unchartered by people on foot.Theres no immediate danger present and furthermore very little likelihood of a renegade car defying the blockade to tear down those in the road, so why are the vast majority coyly sticking to the pavements? Perhaps they think its some kind of decietful trap designed by the authorities to lull the citizen into a state of unshackled freedom only to then apprehend them by once more opening the thoroughfare to the cars. Tricked once to often, the possibility of remaining stood stationery in a spot which ordinarily would see you ground beneath the churning momentum of a 4x4 without disrupting traffic, seems for the flummoxed christmas shoppers too much to process. So the sheer volume of families and clans engaged in their debates on the appropriate choice of present for grandad (could he navigate an ipod?) edge across the pavestones on either end of the road at such a gradual pace you have to pay attention to realise their even moving at all. They're cautious of what such a moment of approved rebellion could unearth in them, watch the glances those on the pavement shoot in envy at the few strutting along the road in brash certainty, embellishing their bravery with swaggers and sneers. I hear fragments of conversations all around swell into a tumultuous dawn chorus of anxieties, jokes and taunts, a girl near me says "and then i tried to save it but i couldn't'

'Theres an elderly lady who lives in my town on the helston road approaching the station. She has registered an impact on me in the last month, through a series of encounters which are all but identical in their tone and content, but for the changing of the seasons around us. The way it will go is that i'll be ambling in my usual state of mild delirium when a frail form in a blue nightie and a head of milk white hair will loom out of a doorway and ask in a quivering but pleasant tone "excuse me dear, what day of the week is it?" At which point on our three prior meetings i have replied after a brief moment of hesitation 'The day is Saturday'. Now, i travel that road every day, give or take a few exemptions, and yet this woman requires assurance about the day of the week it would appear only once a week. On the second meeting i caught a glimpse into the corridor behind her to see a staircase with a stairlift attached and numerous handles attached to surfaces, presumably to aid her balance around the house. A wave of pity started to crest in me as i considered that this brief encounter could be her only contact with the outside world, ambling over the doorsteps frontier into the crisp Winter morning to confirm that she is still compus mentis? But then another more callous thought occured to me, perhaps she is to be tested later to check whether her faculties are all there, the visiting doctor will ask her in a voice of benign reassurance "ok, so can you tell me what day of the week it is? and can you tell me who the prime minister is? very good Vera, now do you know how old you are?" Upon hearing the first inquiry i can imagine her face illuminating with the knowledge i had supplied on my trip up the hill earlier. However ludicrous this train of thought seemed i could not banish the feeling that i was dealing in a cartel of information for the uninformed, it appealed to my inner philanthropist i suppose. What frightened me most in each instance of our dialogue though was the genuine mental exertion i had to perform, i had to seriously consider what the day was. My insecurity rose up and i become disconcerted about having given a senile woman false information- after all if i had to think to affirm it was Saturday then where we not in the same situation? Give them thought then, the shoppers fearing to stray from their habitat in their existential angst and the lady grasping for the security, the familiarity of the weekday in the cold."