I was seventeen, living in Richmond, Surrey, and my home life was very strained. I was working weekends as a dishwasher and I had three extra jobs cleaning offices and a supermarket in the early mornings and evenings on the weekdays. I was nominally attending college, but cutting most of my classes and I could see that I was not going to pass anything.

I didn’t like going home and spent as many nights as possible away. But I had nowhere to stay so this involved cadging a sofa or floor here and there with close and not-so-close friends. I am sure I strained many a relationship and it was very uncomfortable for me as well, relying on the charity of half-strangers.

I had one friend who lived with his family in a cavernous, yet very spacious flat high up on Richmond Hill. I am sure such a place would be well beyond the reach of most people today, but they must have lucked into it at time when the world was less capitalistic.

The flat was warm, badly painted and messy in the most sympathetic way. I think there were three or four children of various ages, all with thick, spiky hair, a raggedly beautiful mother and a father who spent most of his time at home. It was obvious that they were broke. But they were generous with their food and company.

I didn’t spend too much time there, I sensed that I would wear out my welcome quickly, despite their kindness. I slept on the sofa in their kitchen a few times.

I remember waking up one Sunday morning, before the rest of the household. The heat of the night’s sleep enveloped me and I was cosy. I listened to the heartbeat of the walls and knew that soon the family would awaken and share toast, marmalade and hot cups of milky tea. It was bliss tinged with envy for something I might never have.

Their middle son, my friend, showed me one day the source of their income. He took me down to small, cupboard-like workshop. On a workbench stood a wooden hull, a model ship, a small band-saw and a pile of boiled bones. He explained that his father built these ships to look like the prisoner work of captive French sailors who were incarcerated on British hulks during the Napoleonic War. They used the scraps of their rations and scavenged pieces of wood to fashion souvenirs that they sold to the locals to get money for food.

I marveled at the intricacy of his fathers work. The thin planking of bone strips, fixed to the hull with tiny pins, the miniature masts and spars planed and sanded and dipped in tea for aging. It didn’t seem dishonest or wrong to me. I have since seen these models in the showrooms of antique dealers, where they fetch very high prices and my heart jumps with pleasure to know that they kept a good family alive, two centuries later.