INTRODUCTION
STORIES FROM THE ROAD
TRAVELOGS
I'm amazed at my own naiveté. When I look back at places I've live in, adventures I agreed to purely for the experience - I have to just shake my head. I have lived in a tent in Wales. I hitched across the States. I worked as a nanny in the south of France then had to find my own way home since they never paid me. A cabin in the foothills of Santa Fe, New Mexico. A squat in East London.
I even ended up living in a castle in the Black Forest of Germany. I found out afterwards it was an insane asylum that had gone bankrupt; they took me in to help cover the costs. I should have known. On that first afternoon there was a knock at the door. We opened it to find the other residents standing there with bottles if wine in hand.
Come in!
There were about 10 or 15 of them. The last two in brought in a ladder and vacuum cleaner. Helen and I sat on the bed and watched. They weren't talking to us. The wine was for them selves.
'Strange welcoming rituals in Germany aren't there', I whispered. We watched as they took it turns to vacuum every square inch of the ceiling.
Growing up I was fed a diet of European languages and culture, traveling as a kid with the family and then as an adult whenever I could…my writings reflect my observations and impressions from the road.