A rebel without a clue.

All my relations go rotten when alcohol is involved. Even a quiet evening in Headingley becomes a vicious monster once a few beers have been consumed. All about which fighter was Germany's main aircraft in the Second World War! Such a trivial mindless unimportant argument about the past, the dark days of the twentieth century. It doesn't matter. Nothing will change as a result of this passionate and brutal onslaught. Instead of this I could see peace. Decided to head to Hebden Bridge slightly earlier. Not feeling Leeds this morning. Needed to be mindful and let last night fold back on itself. I am blessed as a Son of God. There is a way of seeing last night as another lesson on my stubborn mind. The pain I bring in to being is finite. Perhaps the target I have given my self is the problem.  Waiting for Lent is so silly! Christ didn't chose to go into the wilderness on a specific date! He went because he was called. There is no time. The system says that there is, but that...

How many dog walks along the same old paths! Too many! Unseasonally warm and wet everywhere. Sweating on the inside and drenched on the outside, but it is not Burma 1942! I am not dodging mortar, grenade or sniper. An hour and a half is sufficient this day! I am back to Leeds to check into 69 - mailman bring me no more blues. Then continue to work on these waterlogged boots. The amount of conditioners, cremes and wax I am forcing on these things, but I will introduce water repellency and bring life back to my expensive Meindl Bhutan three season size 10.5s. It appears to be breathing new life where I thought they were a goner! Such a mistake not to treat them prior to their first wearing! No one in Cotswold's told me I'd need to start at the very beginning. This has been such a wet winter, and mud can be so acidic, that they've no chance. I've not developed trench foot, but I had no traction traversing Spofforth Golf course, Green Haggs Lane or Crimple Beck falling at e...

Such prospects. One night over means one last sleep until I get on the road again. The eighth of February is the grande depart along the route I tried back in December 2014. My bed is found for the first two nights. Down in London and Canterbury the graceful Society of St Francis will allow me a night to get in order. I've booked a one way trip to King's Cross at a cost effective £23.50 and I will walk down Kingsway to Southwark bridge. They expect me at 3pm. My thoughts suggest I should walk a little out of London on Shrove Tuesday before I depart east into Kent. Up to Greenwich is a pleasant walk indeed, or Deptford for a moment with Christopher Marlow - I can get an out wards bound train from Lewisham I think! Or perhaps the DLR. I am not following the A2 anywhere. I know Harry Bucknall did but I can't see him struggling with the noise demons? Yesterday I saw Gemma from Leeds Mind and hopefully they will be able to share my journey to those in search of another way out ...

A spectacular week of unbelievable ups and one unbelievable down. But I did it all to myself. Three days of bliss - Walking through Leeds purposely saying Good Morning to all the people i passed, meeting a fellow student of A Course In Miracles, an amazing deep breathing mediation (in my cell) twice, a few pleasant conversations with strangers, another excellent counselling session followed by the second Zen Sangha in Leeds Unitarian Chapel, Mill Hill. Then snooker, pool, darts and chess up at the Brudenell on the afternoon and into the early evening. Walking home through the snow still wishing everyone good day! Then ... becoming a mindlessly stubborn drunk by the end of the evening. I repeated the same pattern of behaviour which seems an established part of my post adolescent self - an emotion out the bottom of my very soul - when I forget I don't need alcohol to be happy! It has taken me two days of this bottoming out depression to see that I allow the other side of me to over...

20th August 2010. I think it was on a Sunday in 1980 and, as was usual, we were taken in the family car by my father, on his only complete day away from the job he usually hated, to visit our relations in Rawmarsh South Yorkshire. We'd drive south on the A1, turn off at junction 36 and pass slag heaps and dirty rivers. We'd cross the Don and fly through Conisborough, Mexborough and Swinton to arrive at Hallam Place, Goosebutt Street,  Parkgate or Claypit Lane. Crossing the Rother and passing many thousands of council houses and coal board housing jostling with the smells of tar, coke, coal and steel industry in the air along to Jean and Milton's abode. Mother and father's oldest friends while they were married: best man, etc., regular guest at our house since I can ever remember. When all else of Rawmarsh has vanished with the death of dad they still occur regularly in my life. Solid as a pair of Doctor Martens boots. Andrew and I were proper childhood pals. Did ...

How to walk in February, through rain, mud, snow, ice and find somewhere to sleep. Homeless people sleep in doorways, they can't be freezing otherwise they wouldn't be alive in the morning. They must cherish wool, thermally protective clothing. Many layers. The smells of their bodies must be beyond their perception. We're not used to our natural smells as the huge perfume and deodorant business demonstrates. We are animals with sweat glands, we perspire to keep cool, yes it smells but that is actually normal. We deny our true nature by pampering our selves in cosmetics and fabric conditioners; Glade, Air Wick and Febreze fill shelves in all supermarkets. But why? What made man hate his own smell? Are we always going to deny our nature. Will scientist develop pleasant smells in our DNA? A few stem cells will consign that industry to the dole queue. Quickly please tweak the genome! How do you sleep in a doorway? How many pairs of socks would be enough pairs of socks? You c...