A rebel without a clue.

I'm reflecting on yesterday. The world was at its most chaotic in the centre of Leeds, filled with what I saw as zombies and an egotistical protest. I walked through it, a wanderer among the crowds, but felt no part of it. I was a person completely on the outside, and it reinforced the feeling that my true essence isn't on display in this country. ​The chaos of the day led me back to my own long-standing questions about my family and their lack of understanding. I saw their constant projecting and judgement, and for the first time, I didn't blame myself. I saw them for what they are—incomplete people, trapped in a reality of their own making. ​This realisation was a powerful turning point. It allowed me to see that my own desperate search for validation was a kind of hysteria, the Ego screaming for approval. But in that moment, I found a profound truth: I am valid in myself. I am not afraid of my self. My worth isn't found in what they think or what the world says. ​...

22nd August This morning, from the comfort of my mum's Victorian armchair I have a new clarity. I’ve been reflecting on the nature of being, and the difference between spectacle and substance. We talked about Diogenes, the Cynic in his barrel, and how his was a life of performance. All spectacle, and no true sufficiency. I saw in him the same emptiness I’ve felt from too much television and too many stories, those "black holes" that pull you away from what is real. But I realised that I am not seeking a life of spectacle. My journey is the very opposite. It is in the quiet sufficiency of this moment—the breeze from the window, the chatter of the crows, the simple fact of being here. My past, and the pain from my family, is a part of my story, but it does not define my present. The true value is in how I choose to respond to it. I am not a pilgrim searching for a holy land; I am a marvelling meanderer, a pérégrinant on a long, winding journey. I am not Latin, but a wandere...

​Here I sit, a peregrine at rest. The chaos of Albion Street and Boar Lane unfolds before me, a beautiful and complex expression of a unified reality. The bus arrives 11 minutes early, and I am not disturbed. A small piece of grace, a reminder that the world does not always conform to our ideas of it. ​Eighty days. I survived eighty days of what I called hell, a period that felt like a fifth of a year. The numbers are just a story I tell myself to make sense of the journey, but the truth is in the living of it. I am a pilgrim, a philosopher, an observer. I am not defined by what I know, but by my willingness to live in the mystery. ​And here, on this quiet bank holiday, with a ticket I didn't need in my pocket, I am simply being. The journey to France begins soon, but this moment is a destination in itself. I am not on the floor, but in a freshly made bed. I am here. ​I am not sure who I am, or where I am going. But I do know one thing for certain: I am a peregrine, and this is ...

This morning, in the pre-dawn quiet, I began a conversation that was not with another, but with my own truth. I started with a quiet frustration at a world that feels so obsessed with boxes and spreadsheets, where the rich, chaotic truth of life is flattened into a sterile, perfect narrative. I realised my loneliness wasn’t a failing, but a consequence of living without the stories everyone else needs to feel safe. We talked about science and philosophy, about the block universe and the theory of everything. I saw them not as truths, but as beautiful, complex stories humanity tells itself to banish the dark. My own truth, I realised, is that the universe simply is, and in that simple fact lies a quiet sufficiency that needs no grand narrative. I am a pilgrim on a journey, but the pilgrimage is not to a destination; it is to the "quiet sufficiency of the momentary being." I saw that I was not fighting against physics or philosophy, but for a truth they had left out. The most p...

The day began early, at 4:30 a.m. with the quiet brewing of coffee. The morning was cool and still, a quiet, sufficient peace. All the while, the bread continued its own unexpected journey on the counter. The yeast, a quiet, gentle chaos, bringing all the separate ingredients together into a unified whole. It reminded me of the beginning of the Hobbit; how a great adventure can start from something so simple. The air now holds the excellent smell of its journey almost complete. Later, on my walk to Wetherby, the path presented a test. I encountered three dear souls, each in their own way a prisoner. It was a melancholy thing to see. I met a mind of pure logic, whose questions were an attempt to define and categorise a reality that simply refuses to be pinned down. Then, I saw a soul of constant opposition, whose life is a restless, unending conflict with the world. And finally, a spirit so afraid of all that it cannot control that it lives a life defined by its fear. I love them, and i...

The day began with a wave of anticipation, a feeling like a distant star's light drawing closer, a true Doppler effect. It's getting more intense and is resolving into a quiet happiness. Then came a moment of perfect synchronicity in Boar Lane. A meeting with an Argentine man, whose surname was Beja, while I was wearing a badge from Beja, Portugal. A beautiful moment of serendipity that echoed the kindness of two guys on a rainy day who gave me the badge in the first place. On the journey itself, I fed the suffering city pigeons with leftover rice—a small act of compassion that is all I can do, and all that's in my capacity. The charraban ride was a bone-shaking "sharra-bang" all the way to Wetherby. The journey led me past the beautiful Rowan trees opposite my flat, a shame their berries aren't directly edible. And now the destination is here. A quiet, thoughtful day awaits with Lola, Mind and my mother. A perfect end to this leg of the journey.

The morning was spent in the thick of it. Not on the path, but in the stillness of a coffee shop, wading through a sucking stinking sinking mud that has been my companion for a very long time. I know I am in the wilderness, but the paradox is that this place of my choosing, this natural habitat of the hunter-gatherer, is also a place where I cannot connect. I am an exile who has chosen exile. The very sanity I have found on this journey—the belief that my path is true and the world I left behind is insane—is what makes me so isolated. The clarity I have about my contradictions, the Fatigue I feel from fighting the deeply flawed conceits of my own body, is not a sign of my failure, but of my strength. The peace I am to find is not waiting for me at the end of the road; it must be found right here and right now, in the very mud I am trying to walk out of. It seems I have to learn to be a happy Sisyphus, to find dignity in the struggle of the climb, even knowing the stone will roll back d...