Rich - It was a Privilege to Know Him.
I am very, very sad to say that Rich (I don't think I ever asked about his surname) - Boat Painter with Heritage Narrowboats at Kent Green and Sherbourne Wharf in Birmingham, canal-man, musicologist, wit, writer of amusing ditties, lover of life and hater of all things pretentious and false has died.
Everybody is unique and a "one off" but Rich had really a very different outlook from anyone else I've ever met. Here's a little bit of what I know about him.
He was uneducated in the conventional sense having run away from school at 14 to live and work on boats (a canal-man through and through) but he could contribute to a conversation on any subject, his natural intelligence, love of learning (mainly from books and radio 4 from what I could tell) and knowledge of history and the (unofficial) lores and ettiquettes of the boating world made spending time with him fascinating and entertaining.
Rich had a deep love of nature and all animals (with the amusing exception of Canada Geese which he detested with equal passion!). His almost psychic relationship with Holly (pub-dog of The Rising Sun with the last tenants) was a pleasure to observe. He called her "Holly-Pop". He was a native of Birmingham but his recent years in Kent Green, with it's pastoral countryside and almost back-in-time magical feeling had made it a second home. His affinity with the land, nature and people enabled him to fit-in as a local with the born-&-breds of the area. In fact Rich mixed happily with anyone of any age or background, penniless or wealthy as long as they meant well and were true to themselves.
One thing we shared was a passion for music and Rich was always ready to swap recordings. For some reason which I find unfathomable (and irritating), most people seem to stop listening to new music when they are 25 or something but Rich was certainly, as always, unconventional in this respect, citing The Chemical Brothers among his favourite artists for instance along with those who adorned his extensive collection including a great deal of prog rock and psychedelia. A favourite band was the little-known Klangstorm and when I last saw him he was just getting into a very intense, Japanese genre of rock.
One thing that made many great nights out with him in The Sun or The Globe was his exceptionally sharp wit and sense of humour. If someone was getting slightly too big for their boots in the way they were talking about themselves he would often listen very quietly and then bring them down with a devastating and hilarious put-down that was somehow also delivered with the utmost affection. He was not averse to writing short poems and songs about local people and events to be unfolded and performed in a local hostelry in the evenings.
Rich had a very keen sense of right and wrong, was very forgiving of peoples mistakes and issues but had no time for pretentiousness or immorality. He once apparently, rather than walk into a busy road due to a car blocking the pavement, - marched straight over the top of the car as if it wasn't there. He eschewed conventional ideas of work having no truck with modern health and safety obsessions and working to his own clock rather than industry's - sometimes starting back to work on a boat at midnight or at 4 in the morning if that's when nature woke him up.
Rich was full of colourful and highly amusing stories about his friends, boats and boating, and his life in and around Birmingham. Ozzy Osbourne still owes him a fiver apparently and he once told me about a makeshift boat repair he made to one he was moving around the country which, as far as he knew, was still held together with a piece of chewing gum stamped into the floor.
I could go on (and on) and no doubt many of his other friends could talk about aspects of him which I know little about. Least to say he was a person who made life that bit much brighter, more meaningful and pleasurable. When I found myself in the Kent Green area I would always ask Phil or Tray at the Rising Sun "where's Rich at the moment ?" and there would always be a sinking feeling of disappointment if he was over in Brum. He will be greatly missed by many people around the canals and beyond.
Everybody is unique and a "one off" but Rich had really a very different outlook from anyone else I've ever met. Here's a little bit of what I know about him.
He was uneducated in the conventional sense having run away from school at 14 to live and work on boats (a canal-man through and through) but he could contribute to a conversation on any subject, his natural intelligence, love of learning (mainly from books and radio 4 from what I could tell) and knowledge of history and the (unofficial) lores and ettiquettes of the boating world made spending time with him fascinating and entertaining.
Rich had a deep love of nature and all animals (with the amusing exception of Canada Geese which he detested with equal passion!). His almost psychic relationship with Holly (pub-dog of The Rising Sun with the last tenants) was a pleasure to observe. He called her "Holly-Pop". He was a native of Birmingham but his recent years in Kent Green, with it's pastoral countryside and almost back-in-time magical feeling had made it a second home. His affinity with the land, nature and people enabled him to fit-in as a local with the born-&-breds of the area. In fact Rich mixed happily with anyone of any age or background, penniless or wealthy as long as they meant well and were true to themselves.
One thing we shared was a passion for music and Rich was always ready to swap recordings. For some reason which I find unfathomable (and irritating), most people seem to stop listening to new music when they are 25 or something but Rich was certainly, as always, unconventional in this respect, citing The Chemical Brothers among his favourite artists for instance along with those who adorned his extensive collection including a great deal of prog rock and psychedelia. A favourite band was the little-known Klangstorm and when I last saw him he was just getting into a very intense, Japanese genre of rock.
One thing that made many great nights out with him in The Sun or The Globe was his exceptionally sharp wit and sense of humour. If someone was getting slightly too big for their boots in the way they were talking about themselves he would often listen very quietly and then bring them down with a devastating and hilarious put-down that was somehow also delivered with the utmost affection. He was not averse to writing short poems and songs about local people and events to be unfolded and performed in a local hostelry in the evenings.
Rich had a very keen sense of right and wrong, was very forgiving of peoples mistakes and issues but had no time for pretentiousness or immorality. He once apparently, rather than walk into a busy road due to a car blocking the pavement, - marched straight over the top of the car as if it wasn't there. He eschewed conventional ideas of work having no truck with modern health and safety obsessions and working to his own clock rather than industry's - sometimes starting back to work on a boat at midnight or at 4 in the morning if that's when nature woke him up.
Rich was full of colourful and highly amusing stories about his friends, boats and boating, and his life in and around Birmingham. Ozzy Osbourne still owes him a fiver apparently and he once told me about a makeshift boat repair he made to one he was moving around the country which, as far as he knew, was still held together with a piece of chewing gum stamped into the floor.
I could go on (and on) and no doubt many of his other friends could talk about aspects of him which I know little about. Least to say he was a person who made life that bit much brighter, more meaningful and pleasurable. When I found myself in the Kent Green area I would always ask Phil or Tray at the Rising Sun "where's Rich at the moment ?" and there would always be a sinking feeling of disappointment if he was over in Brum. He will be greatly missed by many people around the canals and beyond.
posted by JT at 16.1.08
1 Comments:
may he rest in peace and rise in glory.
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