THE J MAN
The J Man can fool you sometimes.
One day you'll see him and he'll look as old as time, practically sweeping stone dust out of his hair. Other days you'll see him and he looks like a mid career Jack Nicholson circa 'Terms Of Endearment' or bang on 1980's 'The Shining'.
Except there's no getting round his very Harry Potter-like scar, the one he got from a beer bottle slashed across his face after mildly provoking a man called Portlock who took offence to the words ... "irvinnie vervinnie" a phrase he borrowed from a tourettic Romany gypsy from Cashes Green.
As Harry knows, a scar can define you but The J Man is far more than just his scar.
A sherbert shamen some have called him, or a warrior protector in the guise of a drug dealing saint, it's better you have the J Man on your side than against you. Times I've broken down in his care and he was like some village elder almost over empathising with my pain. He absorbed my suffering like a giant sponge and wrung it out within minutes before lining up another shot like Karen Allen in her Nepalese bar in 'Raiders of the Lost Ark'. If Ayahuasca was brewed up by the J Man it would surely be with plenty of milk and two sugars. No doubt he's irrevocably shaped the subconscious of the town one way or another with his tea making and its disgused alchemical components.
A brother, a father confessor, a hoarder of secrets - there's nothing the J Man can't do for a man in torment. If Johnny Rooster met with Danny from 'Withnail and I' and had a baby with the BFG they still wouldn't be anywhere close to encapsulating the madness of the J Man.
A one in a million nutter. A diamond in the rough, rough, rough - who's to say he might not save us all in the end, for when the apocalypse comes (as he's foretold), they'll still be one stone waller left standing to repair the shire, undefeated by the dark Sauron-like forces that threaten our very existence.
And did I mentioned his footballing genius?
He called himself "The Sidewinder" on the pitch and that's not just a reference to the water slide at Swindon Oasis but his uncanny ability to turn defenders over, wrong footing them to such an extent he gives them twisted blood. An artist of the turf, he also recognises greatness in his team mates also and gives them their dues. He'd have been a great manager for England if he'd ever managed to stay off the drugs. Or maybe the FA could have made an exception in this regard for him as he would almost certainly guarantee victory on the field. I mean Gareth Southgate could surely use some narcotics to get the England team over the line (pun intended.) He's so sober he'd turn water to drink.
Although I'm convinced the J Man would go viral if ever given the spotlight, he very much prefers to live in the shadows, watching from the back of the bar like Aragorn in The Prancing Pony.
He's been resurrected more times than Jesus and even claims to have met him several times: once in the mountains of Portugal, the other time in the dewy dawn of summer on the cricket pitch at Miserden.
When all is said and done, I'm pretty convinced this particular J Man I describe will eventually save each and every one of us in our local area in his own unique and pecuilar way. He may not be as pure an instrument for God's message as the other J Man but beggars can't be choosers in these troubled time of ours.