A HOMELESS man who has been living rough for 18 years, has launched an appeal with support from the Big Issue Foundation in Exeter, to help him finally put a roof over his head. Glen Walker shares his remarkable story with Fran McElhone
AN abusive home life drove Glen Walker on to the streets at a desperately young age. Picked up off the streets by social services after running away from home, the 12-year-old, who lived in Bristol at the time, was put into foster care.
This lasted a matter of months before he had no choice to return home for another two years of abuse at the hands of his step-father, after suffering abuse, shockingly, at the hands of his foster carers.
Now aged 32, Glen admits he still finds it hard to trust anyone.
So, what does a teenager do who believes he can trust no one to take care of him? He "falls off the radar" and seeks a life avoiding detection from the police and social services, and his parents.
He decided to head to nearby Bath, and with the help of a new found friend was shown a place to lay his head in the shadows under the railway arches, singing A cappella by day, busking for food but falling into the grip of heroin addiction "because it numbed the cold".
He was recorded as a missing person so couldn't stay long in case he was recognised and sent home. So commenced his nomadic existence.
The teenager found himself living in a treehouse commune at a quarry protest site in the Peak District for two years. Glen has never had a home since, spending a total of 18 years on the streets. I ask him to tell me a few of the towns and cities he's lived alfresco, over the years, he laughs and says it would be easier to tell me the ones he hadn't - he's been everywhere from Lerwick in the Shetland Islands to Land's End.
November was the second time Glen ended up in Exeter – the first occasion was when he achieved the tremendous feat of getting himself off heroin, aged 18: Somehow amid all his suffering, he had the foresight to realise that shoplifting and drug taking would only make his life worse.
Becoming a Big Issue seller aged 19, saved him from a far darker existence, giving him light, hope, purpose, self-respect, self-confidence, he tells me.
But now, finally, he's ready to find himself a home. Not a flat, but a boat. And from the Big Issue office in Exeter he launched an appeal on social media to raise the £3,500 needed to buy one of some sort, in order to have a roof over his head, but one that wouldn't restrict a freedom that has come to be his only constant.
But, as luck would have it, thanks to a kindly city stranger buying a Big Issue off him on the High Street, a family member of hers subsequently offered to give Glen a sailing boat, moored a little further away than he reckoned, in Majorca. This twist of fate has changed Glen's plan somewhat – with this offer, the aim now is for the funds raised to help get himself a passport and his ticket out there, a couple of sailing lessons, and help him realise his dream of being homeless no more and set up an outdoor catering business.
Glen recalls the abusive childhood that forced him onto the streets. "I finally left when my step dad threw a meat cleaver at my heard and it narrowly missed," he says.
"I decided I was going, and was going to make sure I was never found until I was old enough to be allowed to be on my own and away from my family. My plan was to jump off the radar."
Glen says the hardest things about his lifestyle have been the cold, and the threat of abuse from vigilante gangs, he say were a particular menace to the homeless community in Liverpool, when he watched a companion getting beaten up, managing to chase off his attackers. This sort of thing he says happened infrequently however, and the majority of the time, mercifully, he's been treated with kindness.
"When I was 17, I went back to Bath and walked into a police station and told them to stop trying to find me," he continues. "And, realising I'd manage to survive on my own and keep out of their way, they left me alone.
"Until this point, I wasn't choosing a life on the streets, but to be away from my parents and abuse.
"I didn't realise I had become addicted to heroin," he admits. "When I came back to Bath to start selling the Big Issue, I hadn't had any for 24 hours and felt really ill, I didn't realise I was clucking – experiencing withdrawal symptoms – and decided I never wanted to feel like this again.
"So I came to Exeter, and stayed in a car park for three days, with a bag of cannabis which helped to get rid of the stomach cramps, and three days later I felt much better. I felt physically secure but not mentally, so thought I'd test myself, and with money in my pocket, I headed back to Bath where I knew I could score, so I could prove to myself I was strong enough to leave it alone."
Which, testament to his tremendous resolve and steely attitude for life, he did.
Glen says he's been overwhelmed by the support he's had for his appeal so far, and he wouldn't have been able to do it without the support of the Big Issue Foundation.
"In November, I woke up one morning and didn't want this life anymore," he says. "I've lived in caravans and tents over the years, and spent a few months on a friend's boat and really enjoyed it.
"I feel like my freedom's gone when I'm inside for too long and I start feeling depressed, so I thought a boat, which I've always had a passion for, would be the sort of go between the outside and in. It could take my travelling lifestyle much further!
"I feel more positive than I ever have before," he adds. "I feel like I have a future now."
To donate visit, Glen's Big Issue Boat on Facebook or visit, www.indiegogo.com/projects/glen-s-big-issue-boat
