Love Life and Destiny

We make plans for our lives, charting out how to spend our time either productively or socially.  Before I left the UK, over two weeks ago, I thought that I had a plan for my new life here in Asia. It proved to be an illusion. Unworkable. Consequently, I have had to rethink matters. I have to go back to work again as I need to both generate an income and be productive. My problem (without being big-headed about it) is that I am capable of doing quite a few things which, unfort unately, creates multiple dilemmas. I have had to sit down and think straight, setting down priorities and working out what is both achievable and in alignment with my future goals. What is it going to be? Fortuneteller, spiritual mentor, life coach, writer, digital nomad or jack of all trades but master of none? Today, I have settled on one course of action. I have gone back into my past, reactivated both a dormant learned skill to produce a future income stream ... That is the beauty of life...

Johnny Hallyday, the name will mean nothing to people outside France but he was huge in the French pop culture. I remember a school visit to Paris in 1962: I was a pubescent 13 year old and in love with the Venner sisters, I am not sure the attraction was reciprocated. Anyway, we were all on the dodgems in a funfair on the Left Bank, slightly intoxicated in equal measure by drinking the cheap brandy I had bought, the excitement of the location and I fancied my chances with the dark haired sirens. The music blaring out was Johnny Hallyday, the French Elvis Presley. He was good .... mais - malheureusement  - Johnny etait francais and French pop did not travel. And then - horror - two sleek handsome, slim hipped French guys appeared and the Venner sisters didn't need a second's thought ... Wandering the banks of the Seine that night, unrequited love for me is associated with this man .... sleep well Johnny RIP Johnny Hallyday: French rock star dies at 74 - http://www.bbc.co.uk...

It's been quite a year. It started with a death sentence, followed by 2 operations, a period of recovery, the all clear, a decision to relocate back to Asia with an on rushing departure date on 22 November. To accomplish this I had a plan. Then I didn't have a plan. Then I had to devise a new plan, so here we are, more or less ready to go. The moral of the story? Life is sometimes unpredictable. Don't sweat the small stuff. Follow your instincts. Have no regrets. Just do it.

I am at that time in life when I am looking back at where I have come from, some of the people that I have met along the way, the impression that they made on me. One memory is that of Daphne Du Maurier, author of Rebecca, Jamaica Inn, The Birds and other modern literary classics. My home was near to Menabilly House in Cornwall, the reputed inspiration for Manderley. I used to walk across the estate, a teenager in search of meaning, lost in my own fantasy land. Cornwall, the home of my fathers, a finger of land seemingly pointing westward towards the New World, is the perfect place to live if you are a writer. The softer south coast, facing the English Channel with the wilder, more rugged north coast hammered  by the harsh Atlantic ocean. You are never far from the sea, wherever you live, and the contrasts challenge you. The combination of low scudding cloud cast from the seas, crouched trees and the threat of rain always bring you back into the moment. When I first met ...

It’s sometimes easy to forget how incredibly brave it is to choose to be a writer. We can get so caught up in the negativity and worry - the writer’s block, the rejection, how much competition there is, how difficult it is to sell our books, that we can all too easily sidestep the fact that actually, we are doing something pretty amazing. Writers are: Resilient Writers are experts at ‘getting back in the saddle.’ Even the very best of us gets knocked down - by publishers, by agents, by critics, by trolls, by ourselves. But when we do we know that there is no point in scurrying away to a dark corner to lick our wounds but instead to learn, to get better and to just keep trying. Persistent Writers know all too well that they might never get the results they want from their work. But they keep trying anyway. If something doesn’t work, they’ll take another look at it or try another route. If someone tells them they are not good enough, they’ll keep searching, and hope that e...

In all probability, mathematically speaking, of course, I have lived the majority of my expected life, even if I make it to 106 years of age like my maternal grandmother. Memories become an important facet of one's life, they provide the waypoints upon which you can reconstruct the more noteworthy fragments of your life. Some of these remembrances can be extremely painful, others bring you much-needed joy at a time when you need it the most. As a writer, especially when your life purpose is centred on disseminating whatever you have experienced for the entertainment of others, memories are my stock in trade. This blog will draw upon these fading imprints in the coming days and weeks, topped up by my travels to far distant places. Some of these memories will be stacked up and compared with places that I lived in over 50 years ago: others will merely provide colour and depth to the ongoing narrative. However, we should always hold to the simple truth that our knowledge...

My life extends to nearly seven decades, I have been a traveller for most of these years. At the age of five, my mother, sister and I flew to Singapore to join my father, a serving British Army officer. The fact that the flight extended over three days will give you a hint at how tortuous flying between continents was in those days. However, it was an exciting adventure, given that overnight stops were made in Cairo and Calcutta, where my first glimpses of an exotic life played out around my very young, disbelieving eyes. India was particularly stunning in that regard as, perched on the back seat of the clanking, fume-belching motor vehicle, that served as our conveyance to our hotel, we wove our way through the pressing crowds obstructing the chaotic streets. Manually pulled rickshaws, humped back cows, women in strange gaudy clothes assaulted my eyes and the pungent smells, my nose. Probably in that single journey, my lust for travel was born. This was an advent...

November 22nd, 2017 will be a defining date in my life: I am leaving the safety of my current home and stretching out to meet my onrushing future. As luck would have it, my future is re-imagining my past. It is not without trepidation that I am taking a step backward into the future as Asia is my destination. This page will chronicle those travels. I have a plan which embraces my spiritual pathway and where I need to be to unlock the insight that my soul is driving me to uncover. There will be lots of pictures and short notes. People to meet. It will be an adventure: I hope that you will come with me as I chronicle this tale. It will be interesting and - perhaps - challenging. We shall see.

I keep coming back to this Blog: it's like a time capsule where I am reminded of things that have happened to me over the last 9 years. I wish that I had written more than I have. The Blog was set up in 2008 and, in the elapsed time, I have lived in The Gambia, India, Thailand and then returned absolutely destitute to the United Kingdom in 2012. Over the last 5 years, I have been homeless but gradually picked up the pieces of my life and made some sense of the events that have highlighted my present and future pathway. Now that I am recovering from the latest scare - cancer - I feel that I am free to roam once more. November 22. 2017. That is a date with destiny.