my blog, my chosen lifestyle

I've been travelling since July 1st, Canada day. Or rather, since July 18th 1992, when I first set out to hitchhike across Canada. Or is it since I first lied to my Mom (sorry Mom!) about how far I was going - "just in the woods a bit"? Ha, more like miles!
No need to get bogged down in details...
This trip is different though, when I set out my intention was to never stop. That's not a hard n fast rule, just an idea. To regard the rest of my life as 'travelling'. I think of it as 'embracing homelessness'. Some may say that's no good, because it's putting things negatively, but I say - humour reigns supreme.
I have been challenging a paradigm or two, and enjoying it. It's fun to sit around a table of nice-dressed proper people, and when someone asks me where I live, to say, "I'm homeless!" with a big grin. Sometimes I add, "and unemployed.." just for good measure. I am not my home, nor my job.
In following this intention, if I do, I will have homes, and jobs, and there are already places I am from. But really, I am a child of God, and neither home nor possessions nor a label ("I'm an environmental lawyer") define me.
There have always been nomadic people, and I have always wanted to be useful in the world. Being nomadic is easy, though difficult, and being useful is difficult, though easy. You can choose to be nomadic, as I have done. It's challenges lie in loneliness, self-doubt, being sick or hungry when you're far away. Being useful you can't choose as easily, it's a little harder to pin down. But sometimes it's simply a matter of simplifying things.
I set out to be a wandering environmental lawyer, fighting for justice wherever I went, or was needed. I've done that a bit, even possibly been useful. But it's funny what intention can lay in your path.
Walking home late one night in Tofino I was contemplating just this issue, and the path I had set out on. I had my friends apartment for the weekend and had been hoping to meet a girl. I didn't. I was feeling sorry for myself on that front and wondering if my destiny was simply different, if I was supposed to help people. Like a wandering knight, on a quest he knows not where, a quest whose goal is shrouded in mist. And thinking - that the chivalric code always applies - you must help those you meet on your path that need you. If ever your distant goal is more important than a human in front of you that needs your help - you will surely fail.
Literally the moment I finished that thought a girl wiped out on her bike across the street from me, pretty badly. I looked up, wryly, and crossed the street.
Her friend was really drunk, but trying. We called 911, I helped the girl out of the ditch, her face was covered in blood. I held her to keep her warm until the ambulance showed up, kept her friend calm, dealt with the crowd and ambulance drivers and cops, got a friend to take care of her bike and a reasonably sober friend to go to the hospital with her.
I've jumped half a dozen cars in the last three months, all over the states and Canada. Shuttled wounded people around, picked up hitchhikers, counseled friends.
Everyone gets what they want.
I met a lovely human being in a health food store near Mt. Shasta in Northern California a few weeks ago. We chatted a bit in line and she mentioned that her son that day had worn a cape (and a mask), and that he was a little old for that, but she didn't discourage it, because really - everyone should wear capes.
I thought a lot about that, and this blog is my cape, or part of it. I agree with it - let's not be afraid to be hero's, or to try. Let's not be afraid to be the best we have inside ourselves. And let's not hide it away.
This is my chosen lifestyle, this is my blog.