Love

Where is the love? its all around us, it´s in the breeze, the trees, in between our knees. It´s waiting to be found. Not to be looked for but to be found.

I am heading out on foot through the valleys and the trees leaving Millie behind me. I have given the van to an Israeli woman and her son and they will be driving it to Italy where I will meet them. I have never felt free-er in my life.

Before you read any further I just want to add any of the following or preceding feelings that you may read are mine. I in no way profess them to be true or in any way factual for anybody but myself. They are merely my feelings at this point in my life. Please enjoy them at a distance and take from them what you will.

It´s strange, last blog I spoke of this phrase "I have everything that I need" and that I was about to put it into practice. I have news to report. I have everything that I need. All we need is here for us. All the time. Whenever we need. I feel this next statement to be true; the moment we love ourselves, all is possible. Easier said than done I´d say but then I would say cause I am in the heart of a lifelong process of understanding these words. And I´m making some beautiful mistakes! It´s so beautiful. In a way its completely impossible, how can we ever really make a mistake because as soon as something takes us away from Love and from what we really enjoy then it also iluminates what we do love. I feel sometimes we need to live an eternity of what we don´t need just to bring us round to see and feel and trust what we do. And i don´t mean in terms of deep and meaningful lifechanging necessities I mean the simple day to day.

I was at a "spiritual talk" two days ago. What an absurd name for a talk, I love it´s ridiculousness, when is a talk not a spiritual talk, asking for milk is a spiritual talk, how can an action not be spiritual. We are all balls of energy, all manifestations of this mystical creation we refer to as spirit, how can we be anything but spiritual, to shit is as spiritual as meditation. Within this spiritual talk there was alot of reference to acceptance, to love, to searching deep within for that place where fear and anxiety cannot go. I agree with all of these and I loved that somebody was creating a space where people could come together and discuss these issues. I wondered why we weren´t also talking about diet. About sleep. About cleanliness and our day to day habits. I love "spiritual talks" don´t get me wrong, a little bit of self investigation and emotional masturbation are great at times but I feel at this particular talk something was missing. Life does not just consist of meditation and visualisation, we must all exist in the material world whether we like it or not and even with that we have a choice. If we choose to stay we have another choice to make, whether to learn how to function in the most loving way for ourselves or whether to try and function in the river of everyone elses disfunction.

At this current moment in time I feel blessed. Because I have lived a life that has led me to being able to create a world that is full of Love. Bringing together a really healthy day to day habit that honours all that I need. The fact that I as a person like to be clean and well fed. I am understanding more and more the foods I enjoy and what my body needs and I feel so much calmer for it. For this calmness I also feel more capable of listening to my heart and what it needs, when I need space for myself when I need the company of others. Learning to give myself an abundance of all whenever I need it. I can easily forget sometimes that abundance can be a piece of bread, a nap, an apple, a conversation, a mountain as easily as it can be a full day of manual labour. It´s whatever I feel it to be. The joy of being able to hear my mind, my heart, my soul my body and allow them to flow together and work with each other when they need and take space from each other when they don´t.

I am about to do something that I never thought possible. I am about to walk off into the unknown with nothing but a rucksack and an open heart. And here is the beauty. I know with every ounce of my being, even my little toes the most doubt filled of extremities, that everything I need will be brought to me as and when I need. I am full of love and always will be.

Why does love exist? Because we have this little part of our back that we just can´t reach.

Happy New Year

Hello all,

Much love, Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.  I hope it has been a beautifully festive festive period.

I have been living in a hippy commune for 3 weeks now and can quite safely say I am a fully fledged hippy. I'm living off a diet of raw food and hallucinogenics, having endless unprotected sex with as many people as possible and I haven't washed my hands in four weeks. So far its going quite well but pooing outside is going to take a little getting used to.

Amidst all of this connection with nature, becoming one with myself and animals I was bitten by a feral cat. It was quite a wonderful experience on the whole. I was on the drive from Orgiva to Malaga to collect my Sister, I was completely lost, again. I eventually asked a stranger where a good place to sleep was and he lead me to a small beach that had been squatted for the past five years. It's 30m long enclosed on both sides by rockface and from behind by Bamboo. The bamboo was so thick that people had cut and bent a house in the middle of it. I had been hoping for a solitary evening on a beach for so long and I stumbled across the quietest and most beautiful squatted beach. I swam in the sea, meditated in the sun and began speaking with some of the beautiful people who lived there. All was going well until a young woman I was speaking with said the following statement pointing at the sea.

"Is that a goat?"

I looked out to the sea and saw what looked like a large black log rolling around helplessly in the waves about forty metres out. I thought this woman must be on the raw food/hallucinogenic diet, until out of the water rolled a tail. I was blessed with a wonderful moment where there was no indecision, no thought and before I knew it I was naked swimming towards a drowning cat. I picked it up out of the water with my right hand and began to swim it back to shore. I learnt three things that day. One; A frightened animal on the brink of death is a dangerous animal. Two; never pick up a drowning cat from underneath where it can reach your hand with its mouth. Three; if an animal bites you while you are in the middle of the sea don't try to shake it off because it simply bites down harder. It bit me twice. It hurt and bled alot. The hippies gave me warm clothes, a tin of fish and a warm fire by which to rest my bones. They seemed so calm and generous that when it turned out they were heading back to the same village I had just driven from I offered them a lift. That night I slept in the open air, sea lapping at my feet, an endlessly starry vista above me and a wonderfully warm feeling within me. I woke up the next day and the three hippies I had offered a lift to had transformed into six, the majority of which were drunk, toothless and wonderfully rowdy. We set off early to pick up my sister from Malaga airport. I can only imagine her face when instead of being greeted by me, her brother, a face she loved and recognised. She was greeted by six drunkards walking aimlessly around Malaga airport holding cardboard signs screaming "Katy!!!" at the tops of their voices. Was a beautiful journey home.

I am loving my life at the moment. I am waking up each day and learning afresh how I have to live to be content. I am doing alot of Dancing, Yoga, Tai-Chi, we are all working together to build a house for one of the guys that lives with us and I am making so much art. So many ideas, so many stories, poems pouring out of me. It is also becoming so much clearer when it is time to try and do stuff and be around people and when it's time to go and lie down with a blanket over my face. Something I've never really been able to do before, I normally just get over-excited and keep going until I collapse but here I'm finding a much more sustainable rhythm. It's a great relief.

There is only one more thing to share. I have nearly run out of money. It's interesting. Normally I would be worrying and stressing for a solution to this apparent problem. But i am so inspired by everybody I have met on this journey who simply trust that money will look after itself. I find myself strangely calm. I am going to throw myself into pennylessness and trust that all my needs will be met. I will let you know how it goes, hopefully the next blog won't be a call out for the relief fund.

Thank you for the wonderful feedback for the first chapter of Katius. I was anxious about sharing it but the feedback has been beautiful and really humbling. Thank you. There has been a delay in the building of the website so you will have to wait for the next chapter but I promise you it's on the way.

I wish you all much love and hope life is bringing you all that you need. And mum don't worry I was only joking I am eating lots of hot food, steering clear of free love and hallucinogenics and I am washing my hands very regularly.

Hippy Communes....

Before I begin I wish to share two texts I received these past weeks that made me smile:

"Just enjoy, lose all assumptions and preconceptions and find your calling mate"

"Don't start wearing beige, don't join a cult and watch out for worm tablets"

Both equally inspirational in their own way. Keep the messages of support coming in they are wonderful.

I am writing this under the shade of an olive tree to the soundtrack of birdsong and dutch people cleaning. I have finally arrived in a place that I would like to call home and it feels wonderful. I am in a very small community of around twenty – thirty people called El Morreon. The land belongs to a wonderful man whose name I can only just pronounce and have no idea how to write. We will call him Melkeor. He has lived there for years and bought as many caravans as he can afford and made this a wonderful place for like minded people to come and live together. My first night here there was a night of singing. The second day was a day full of the most inspirational conversations about humanity and the soul,  yesterday afternoon I cooked on an open fire for around fourteen people as almost the entire community pitched in to help level the ground so they could begin building a house for a wonderful Dutchman called Rolan. It’s quite a wonderful atmosphere made by astoundingly beautiful countryside and the generously humble people that populate it. I think I will stay here now for the next year or so if the community will allow and start to build a home for myself. Just writing that phrase on it’s own is a weight off my shoulders. I was preparing myself to wait for months maybe even a year until I found somewhere that felt like home but everything about this place feels right. With the wealth of expertise from metal work, woodwork, agriculture, art of many kinds and how to live sustainably as a community I have so much to learn here. I feel like a child again, every day I am waking up anew and re-defining what it is that makes me tick, or as an inspirational man who has been living here Tom put it, ‘finding what gives me my wow factor’.

It’s always amazes me how several people can come and give you the same piece of advice in several different ways. Each filling in different colours of the same picture. Over the past few days this same theme keeps bubbling up; find what fills you with love and then do it as much as you can, find what gives you your wow factor and then dive head first into it and trust that all your needs will be met. There was a wonderful old man called Gert who came to play guitar for the singing night. He was the closest to a guru I think I have met in real life. He was around fifty years old, very slim, long greying hair and long grey beard surrounding a warm and child like smile. He could take the most complex of ideas and condense them down into the most simple of images. He told many stories but the one that stuck in my mind was the one of his life. He was working in his mid twenties in an old peoples home when he realised whatever he was doing wasn’t for him. He quit his job and started travelling and working as a musician, he lept into the unknown and let go of any fear that his needs woulnd’t be met and he said for the past thirty years he has always had everything he needed. Money, love and food had always arrived at the right time. It filled me with hope. I still live with fear, fear that I might not eat enough, that I might run out of money, that I might get so worked up in the excitement of all these new discoveries that I might get lost in them. But to speak to all these wonderful people who are here living the proof that if I relax and trust what I am doing then all my needs will be met. Oof. It’s a hard thing to trust but I’m closer than I think I have ever been.  
Before I arrived at this hidden paradise I was in another one. One with equally marvellous scenery but with much more negative and sceptical inhabitants. People either wanted my money or for me to leave. So I left. It was an experience I didn’t particularly enjoy but it did teach me a lot about the potential pitfalls of trying to create an alternative community. They preached an escape from Babylon/capitalism but really they had just created the same structure under a different name that is funded mainly from dealing drugs to tourists. I hear it started as a beautiful place built with foundations of love and then over the years is has evolved into a very negative place. I saw a few special groups of people while I was there who I have since heard are desperately trying to leave.

I woke up this morning looked out of my window at the sun kissed mountains and I heard children laughing and birds singing. I knew I was home. I have a safe space to make work, process and explore ideas, the ability to create solitude and also access a warm and thriving community. We are talking about building a communal kitchen and a sweat bath. I am equally excited about both. I know it will not all be communal kitchens and hippy idylls of love and equality, to give birth to anything can be a painful process but I know what I have found here is worth it and the pace of life is so different here. There is no rush and no manic desire to finish things, just to let them happen in their natural rhythm. It's great.

Now we come to the wonderful point of my Novel. The votes are in and there is overwhelming consensus for the recorded version. However my recording device has broken….So we are caught in what I believe is known as a conflict of interests. So ladies and gentleman you may have the written version but you will have to wait for my dulcet tones a little longer until an alternative recording device materialises. I have tried to attach the chapter as a document and post it as a website etc etc but I'm terrible at computers. A friend of mine is constructing a website for the remainding chapters but this first one I simply add below. Please enjoy and share.

Much love to you all and I hope you are well.

Katius

By Gregory Bartlett

Chapter 1

How do we begin a story such as this one?

A simple story.

A story of a woman.

A story of epic proportions.

A story that deals with some of the most basic of human instincts.

We will begin at the beginning.

Once upon a time, in a place not yet heard of in a time not yet conceived lived a young woman called Katius. A tall woman with about as much appetite for life as a Swamp Droogler for anger or a Mushy-trog for sleep. Sometimes she would thrive for life so much that it was all she could do but sleep for months on end to recuperate.

She enjoyed her existence greatly and if it wasn’t for having to keep up with various part time jobs, the task of looking for a life partner and what seemed like never ending pressure from the upper parental department of progress then she would have undoubtedly told people “I live a very happy life”.

But little did she know that on the 45^th of Desmember, year four, fifth cycle all that was about to change forever.

It was an ordinary day, a day like any other, the sky was it’s regular purpley green and the mushy-trogs were busy sleeping by the side of the road. Katius had just finished teaching Smarmish to foreign students and was now in the entertainment district where she helped a man maintain robots. She had just started sanding down some of those hard to reach places when a young man kicked the door, threw several looks of terror around him, spotted Katius and cried.

“You have to hide me!”

They both stood stock still. There was a wonderful silence that cut through the air, the kind of silence that imprints itself upon the brain with alarming clarity. She took a look at the young man. She felt from his face that he hadn’t eaten in a while and from his clothing that he had either very little money or very little fashion sense, possibly both. She could see he was completely out of breath so whatever he was running from was probably close behind. But these were minor details, he also had a pro Mushy-trog emblem on his shirt. In Katius’s mind anyone who supported these wonderful creatures had to have a good soul. She leapt to a decision that would change her life forever. She hid him.

Within moments she was back sanding robots with a young man hidden in a box of spare body parts just behind her. With the young Mans trustful gaze in a spare part box, Katius’s brain suddenly had space to contemplate what was taking place. Doubt was suddenly streaming through her mind faster than she could comprehend.

“Why have I just hidden a complete stranger in a house that isn’t mine? Why is he on the run? what if he’s a rebel of the state?  What if he’s a murderer?” An image of him bloodied and confused flashed before her eyes. Amazing what can course through your mind in heightened states.

She had swept herself up into such a confusion that she had given herself a severely troubled look and had nearly sanded away this poor little robots crotch. Now is the perfect time to introduce this poor little robot. It’s name is Pinny and is a now very outdated early prototype of the first robot child. Very emotional, very dependant and easily frightened.

With a head almost entirely made of a similar substance to Wood called Urdu he wasn’t the brightest of children and panicked easily. With this in mind it’s understandable that after seeing a strange man hide in his spare part box, followed by Katius turning a strange tone of panicked green while franticly sanding away his crotch, Pinny was a little out of sorts. So it’s equally understandable that when two large smelly Swamp Drooglers walked in it was all just a little too much for him. What he desperately wanted to do was to communicate to Katius, a woman he trusted, that he was uncomfortable with the situation and would like it to return to normal, or at the very least a little closer to normal with an added clarification that everything was going to be ok. What he actually did was to hit his survival mode. He jumped off the table threw his arms in the air and begin to run blindly round the room screaming “help me, help me”, changing direction only once he had run into something. After hitting two walls, a large chair, knocking over a light and the food dispenser he finally knocked himself out by running into one of the Swamp Droogler’s large protruding stomachs.

Swamp Drooglers: They are very large creatures from the same genetic family as Humans however millions of years of working in swampy conditions have left them somewhat warped. They are about twice the size of a standard humanoid with thick purple green skin, which is not only impenetrable but has no sense of feeling. They have two hearts; one for circulation, one for heat. They also allow various bacteria and fungus to live on them in return for cleaning their tough outer layer. They have short legs with wide webbed feet, long arms with wide webbed hands, large chest with and even larger protruding belly topped by extremely small heads. Wonderfully bizarre creatures with a very short temper. A great way of telling whether a Swamp Droogler is about to kill you is that He or She will change colour, He or She will turn from a purpley green to a dazzlingly intense scarlet red. On this particular day both of these particular Swamp Drooglers were the most intense of scarlet reds. Katius was petrified.

“Where is he?” One of them gargled in a thick swampish accent

“Who?”

“The humanoid” The other gargled back. Both the Swamp Drooglers ears pricked up, listening for any tell-tale sign of a stow-away.

Even to this day Katius doesn’t quite know why or how she did what she was about to do. It was one of those magical moments that happens to you as opposed to the other way round. Katius practically ran at them both and screamed.

“What in Barbles name do you think you’re doing?!” still marching towards them, she chickened out half way and started heading for the now imobile Pinny.

“Pinny, Pinny!” She cried making a fairly useless attempt to resuscitate him. The Swamp Drooglers were stunned for a moment.

“How dare you walk in here unannounced, you know my son is on deaths door!”

The Swamp Drooglers ears softened the scarlet lessened.

“We never” One of them gargled

“Don’t play ignorant you big oafs, you should be ashamed of yourselves”

“We were looking for somebody” Gargled the taller of the two

“You were looking for somebody! You were looking for somebody!” Katius wailed, boldened by how convincing her performance was “Is that an excuse to come in here and frighten my son to death, and look at the mess you have made, and it’s his birthday!” the words were pouring out but they weren’t hers “I wanted him to have one last special birthday and you’ve ruined it!!” Whatever autopilot had taken over was doing a brilliant job, there was nothing Swamp Drooglers loved more than family values. The more anxiously she feigned the role of mother the more the scarlet began to drain away from the Swamp Drooglers skin.

“Is he dead?” the one gargled

“Very nearly, just get out”

“We’re very sorry madam”

“We didn’t know he wasn’t well”

“Really we were looking for someone, it’s our job you see”

“Yeah well, not really our job, I’m a postman”

“Why are you telling her that?”

“Well it’s true isnt it?”

“It’s got nothing to do with it Eric. Why would she want to know that you’re a postman”

“well I am, I’m just here cause you asked me. He’s got a bad back you see”

“Why are you telling her that?”

“I can’t help it, I’m nervous”

A confused silence hung between them.

They both turned round and began to leave.

“Well that was bloody stupid Eric”

“I didn’t know he was sick”

“You’ve killed a boy today Eric I hope you’re proud of yourself”

Katius sat by Pinny in shocked stillness. Not quite sure what had just happened and not quite sure what to do next. Fortunately a voice from inside the spare part box took away any element of decision making.

“Have they gone?” 

Katius looked at the box for a moment then looked around the room.

“They’ve gone.”

The spare part box began to open very tentatively. Out came the young man preceded by several arms, legs and a bizarelly lifeless wooden face. The young man stood there in a calm stillness, one of profound gratitude. Although he said thank you to Katius atleast 100 times that day he didn’t need any of them, she understood it all in that one moment and no amount of thank you’s ever would have said it better.

“Thank you” He said

“That’s ok”

“No really thank you”

“It’s fine”

“You saved my life”

“Yeah”

“We should go”

“We?”

“Yeah”

 “I know nothing about you” She blurted back

“I’m fourteen cycles, you just saved my life, I like the colour blue, I’m pro mushy trog and I don’t own a single pennydrop, we can fill in the rest on the way but we should definitely go”

Katius was full of adrenaline and drawn to this stranger in a way that she neither understood nor had space to explore. Convinced but not quite sure why she quickly hung Pinny up on his wall bracket and they both set off into one of the best purpley pink sunsets Katius had ever seen.

Granada!

Hello all.

For those that are just joining us I have packed up my job, bought a motorhome called Millie and I am now travelling around Europe. We are a month in and it's great. Lonely, a little cold, but great. 

I am no longer battling the cold of western France. We are now battling the intense cold of the Spanish night times. Millie and I have finally arrived in the south of Spain! I am currently in the public Library of Granada using their wifi after returning from some hot springs about twenty miles away in a town called Santa Fe. They were stunning, Millie and I were parked up a dirt track in an olive farm in the middle of the mountains, two feet from a natural hot spring. There isn't a shop for miles around, just hot springs, trees and naked old men. It was great. Bizarrely just what I needed.

These are the main thermals which were full of young people and noise, I opted for the quieter one round the corner that was smaller and populated by a collection of old men and two beautiful people from Gibralta. It's a favourite spot for homeless, jobless and local farmers to come and bathe, who it would transpire in the town of Santa Fe are mainly old men. My time in London before I left was emotional and the drive here has been long and tiring. Two days relaxing in a thermal bath was exactly what I needed. Thankyou Nick Southcombe, who after reading the first post recommended I visit Granada and these thermals, both of those recommendations have been stunning. I will also be visiting the community you recommended within the next few weeks.

The drive was challenging to say the least. I hugged my friend Jon goodbye on a wet and windy Bordeaux morning and it was another ten days until I had any real contact with another human being, unless of course you count the old woman just outside Madrid who told me off for not trying her honey properly. Thank you, you made me smile. I think it was the combination of the enclosed space, intense cold in the night time and endless Spanish countryside full of abandoned villages. One of the naked old men, a local farmer, told me that certain areas of Spain have been struggling with poverty for so long that there was no work and no food so people just upped and left, leaving whole villages to fall apart. It's bizarre to see so much desolation in what is essentially a first world country. I saw some grafiti that summed it all up, "A dignified future for the Villages of La Mancha!" I hope they find one.

On a seperate note.

Dear Spanish countryside,

You are incredibly beautiful. 

I salute you.
 
Yours truly.

Greg

p.s. why is your earth so red? It's nice, just a bit weird.

The solitude of the drive was broken beautifully as I arrived in Granada. I picked a random spot in the middle of granada via my gps and ended up on top of a hill full of motorhomes. What are the chances I hear you cry! it gets better. I parked up next to a van with a unicycle and a book on meditation on the front seat. For those of you that don't know me, I love to meditate and I have been part of a circus since I was 5. This van's front seat epitomised two of my great loves in one static gesture. I was so excited by the idea of it's owner, this human being, a potential doppelganger, soulmate, maybe even my future bride. I worked myself up so much I had to have a lie down. It turns out it wasn't my future bride it, was a young man from Sweden and niether of the objects were his. This is where the story begins to take a slightly different tone. That night he invited me to a soup he was making. It's funny how things can get lost in translation because It turned out that what that really meant was "Can you come make a soup and then do the washing up, alongside breakfast and dinner for the two following days" Now the first day after the soup he had fallen ill so I gave him the benefit of the doubt after that I began to notice a slippery slope developing.It wasn't until I was alone in the Thermals that I realised if I stayed close to this man, as lovely, charming, interesting and connected to Granada as he was. A large proportion of my time would be spent cooking and cleaning. For him. I think the old me would have kept friends with him and just struggled to try and make something work, feeling guilty every time I had to ask him to clean up and feeling tired everytime I cooked. Fortunately I have since moved to a new even more picteresque location and have found some incredible human beings who receive my generosity with thanks and the reciprocation of theirs. It's a much more agreeable exchange all round really I don't know why I didn't do that in the first place.

It's beautiful, I am now parked up in a place called Sacromonte, which translates as holy hill. Its a hillside overlooking Granada, full of caves. They call them caves they are actually houses that people have dug into the sides of the mountains. It started off as a gipsy village but it is now the heart of alternative Granada: full of fascinating characters, art, music and great decorations. The majority of caves are covered in colours, banners, tropical plants and the most bizarre outdoor furniture, I have never seen so many sofas or arm chairs on a hillside. I played football with a load of people from the caves yesterday and they were lovely, aggresive footballers but lovely people.

Whats that viral community? You want to hear about my artistic endeavours so far? Well I'm a little embarrassed to bring it up really but as you've asked I'm writing a novel. It's called "Katius". It's really good. It's exciting, full of love, danger, self discovery and loads of weird creatures that don't exist yet. I started it four years ago as a gift for my sister and every year I write another chapter for her birthday and then another for Christmas. What's that viral community? You would like to read said novel released chapter by chapter as an online serial? Ok I'll stop that now, would you like to read my novel? I'm releasing the first chapter with my next blog absolutely free of charge. One question would you like it as a pdf document or as an audiobook? Let me know as a comment on here, via email or as a comment on any of the facebook links which you'd prefer. Whichever gets the most requests will become a reality.

It's been beautiful so far, learning how to become more comfortable with solitude, learning how to live with the intense cold of the Spanish nights and how to be guided by that little voice in my stomach. More and more I am enjoying getting lost and the wonder that comes out of the unknown. More and more I am discovering how fortunate I am and more and more I am missing peanut butter, swings and round abouts. As always if you have any suggestions as to where I should go next please keep them coming all the suggestions so far have been amazing!

Thankyou for reading and for the continued support, please continue to share with anyone you wish and do let me know if you would like to read the first chapter of my novel Katius or have it read to you with a series of different and enjoyable comedy accents.

Much love and I hope you are all very very well.

Thank you

For those of you who missed the first post this is my blog. 

I have spent my life savings on a motor home and I am currently driving around Europe in it. 

It’s called Millie. She looks like this.

I once heard decision making is like jumping into a stream. The decision to leap is difficult but once you are there the flow of the current takes you where you need to go. I currently feel like I'm in a huge river after taking what feels like 5 years of checking the temperature and holding onto the edge. For the first few days I was wondering if it was the right decision? is it pure lunacy? This morning I woke at sunrise surrounded by woodland and stepped outside to meditate in an open field, the rising sun kissed the dew on the interweaving network of long grasses and spiderwebs that lay around me while the sky blue was so open above me I felt it might consume me, a swarm of sparrows swirled and danced like a shoal of little black fish in the sky. It was so silent. It was so wonderful. I had been asking for a sign that I was on the right track. That was a really good one.

I now have a few thank yous:

On a more general note I would like to say thank you to the incredible response to this blog, from all personal emails, to comments on here and Facebook, the warmth, enthusiasm and support is incredible, humbling and the best kind of motivation. Thank you. Thank you for your wonderful suggestions as to where I should go; the more interesting communities, people or places to visit the merrier.

Now on a more personal note; thank you to the wonderfully generous stranger who let me stay at their house when my Paris accommodation fell through and Millie was locked in a car park. You’re wonderful. Thank you to the beautiful couple who got in their car in the dead of night when we were lost and drove us half an hour to the nearest free camp site. Thank you to another couple who very patiently taught me how to pick and prepare wild oysters, they were delicious. Thank you to the inspirational old Swedish man, the route you planned for me has been amazing! Thank you France for the incredible amount of ambigious or simply false signage, Millie has driven over 1000 miles this trip, a good 200 of which have been lost. Thank you to the man running the circus in Bordeaux who, again when we were lost, let us park on their site for free. Thank you to my friend Jon Whitten who accompanied me from St.Malo all the way down to Bordeaux, you are an incredible human being and it was an honour to be serenaded so much by you and your ukulele, good luck back in London. Finally thank you Paris for reminding me why I don’t like living in big cities.

How is it that people are so generous? Have they always been this way? Did I need to get into a Motorhome to see it fully or are they always like this? Are people like this in London and I just never noticed or is it just more difficult to do in big cities, easier to get dragged into tunnel vision. I don’t know. But I do know how wonderful a small deed feels when received. I wish I could package up how all these people have made me feel and send it to them, what a wonderful thing to receive that would be. They should definitely figure out how to bottle that.

The joy of a trip like this is that I wake up in the morning and if I like the place that I am in then I stay, if I don’t then I don’t. I’ve noticed each time that I try and think through logically where to stay it is never as nice as when I allow my gut instinct take the wheel. Yesterday was a wonderful example. I saw a wood that looked beautiful, drove into it and kept driving until I found a spot where I knew I could park safely. I was tucked in off the road on the edge of a field surrounded by trees and woke up to the most amazing sunrise. I think I will have to learn to speak gut a bit more fluently.

I have decided that in a past life Millie must have been an amphibian of some kind. I have found and fixed two exterior leaks, a leaky boiler and replaced a broken roof window. She is permenantly trying to flood herself. I thought I had finally waterproofed her until I arrived late one evening to find the living room had turned into a swamp. It transpires there is a gaping hole in one of the wheel arches and whenever I drive on wet road the wheel flicks all the water right into the living room via a chest of drawers. My friend Jon was a godsend, he not only found the leak, after having had no sleep on an 11 hour ferry, he helped me dry out most of the damage and put together a patch made of old bike inner tube. It still smells a little of damp and it completely destroyed an entire bulk box of 40 odd peanut snack bars but its now waterproof. I’m gutted about the snack bars, We scattered two of them in a nearby wood as an attempt to gain some closure, it kind of worked.

I hope you are all well in whatever you are doing and again a massive thank you for all the wonderful support, it’s amazing to know there is such a wave of positivity following me wherever I go. Be blessed and remember, never go quick over speed bumps when you have potted plants in the back of your motor home.

A motorhome, laptop, unicycle and not much else

"I just can't do it any more, everyone wants to do everything so fast, nobody looks each other in the eye."
"I know"
"It's just not healthy, getting that tube every morning is horrible"
"I never get the tube at rush hour"
"I have to, its like condensed stress"
"I know. So what are you going to do about it?"
"What?"
"Well its easy to complain about, but what are you actually going to do about it? What can any of us do about it?"
"I don't know"
"Not even an idea?'
"Not a clue"
"Hmm" 

About six months ago the above conversation appeared in my life repeatedly. Differing depending on how good a mood I or the person on the receiving end was in and whether we were drinking wine or tea. I became so obsessed with this lack of eye contact that friends started avoiding me for fear of being propelled into a deep and meaningful conversation on their tea break. In my short 25 years as a human being I have had many jobs ranging from painter decorator to a receptionist, from a waiter/barman to theatre maker/circus artist. I have been blessed to have had a glimpse of many different worlds, many different ways of being and many different cultures. This kaleidoscope of realities is a big part of what has propelled me into this next chapter of my life:

I have quit my job and spent all of my savings on an old motorhome called Millie and I am currently in Paris on the first leg of my world tour. With such a huge change, one of the few constants in my life are these three words. "I don't know".

"Why a motor home?"
"I don't know"

"Where are you going to go?"
"I'm going to start in the South of Spain, after that I don't know"

"How are you going to make money?"
"Great question"

"How long are you going for?"
"I think a few years but I don't know"

"Why are you leaving in winter?"
"I don't know"

"What is going to happen when you have been on the road for a long time, haven't found a soul to speak to, you've run out of money, you're wishing you could go home but any hope of contacting help seems lost, you're eating your last tin of baked beans cold out of the tin and you're water tank is running low?"
"Can I get back to you?"

So many unknowns, so much to be discovered. The truth is I am hugely excited and at the same time equally anxious. Because of course these questions that everyone keeps asking are wonderful questions. How will I earn enough to feed myself and Millie my Motorhome? Will I survive the cold long enough to reach the south of Spain? Will I drive for two hours and suddenly realise I hate living in a motor home? Why leave security in a time of such economic fragility to live in a van? I could answer all of these questions wonderfully but the truth is that I don't know.

A few years ago that would have been enough to keep me at home in the security of a weekly wage. However the time has come for change. I feel ready now to strike out and create my own path, listening and learning from those that I meet yet forging my own way of living that fulfils and enriches. I have tried for a long time to live fulfilling the needs of others and breathing the rewards this brings but I missed something. I forgot to fill myself along the way. Constantly giving outwards and only remembering to water my own roots once I was starving. Time for change is definitely afoot. I have so many people that have helped me get here, to a place where I now own a motorhome, laptop, unicycle and not much else. And I am filled with gratitude for everyone that took part in helping me get here, 'cause it is the people in my world that have left me with the courage to step out into the unknown. To step forward countless questions still unanswered, with the knowledge that somehow everything will be alright. And for this privilege I am endlessly grateful.

I am looking forward to being blown in the right direction, to being blown closer to understanding those three words "I don't know". Not necessarily closer to knowing the answers to questions people ask, I'm not looking for a way to avoid saying them. If anything I'd love to find a way of being able to say them more often.

But before I finish I need to ask for your help. I will be looking for sites of outstanding natural beauty and communities that are developing ways of being that are based on generosity, love, acceptance and equality. If the two are together even better. If anybody has any recommendations as to where I should begin please share them. I'm heading from Bristol to Cornwall and then the South of Spain via France. Beyond that who knows. I hope this blog, this documentation of what I find, can be as much a dialogue as possible. If you have any thoughts, questions or suggestions as to where I should go or how I should improve the blog then please leave feedback, it's more than welcome.