Today my mind wandered around the nooks and crannies of the question of what I am doing here. Not here on the blog. I mean here – in this physical, mental and emotional space – and perhaps not even what I am doing here, but rather, what I want to be doing here. What am I hoping to achieve?

My 20 exercise books hold clues to what I want to work on over the next year and beyond. They are entitled:

1. Custom Canine Care (this is the name of my business)
2. Running a pet services business
3. Marketing and SEO
4. Cooking in a van
5. Stuff!
6. Foraging for food
7. Living the life I choose
8. Multiple income streams
9. Living in a van
10. Life with less waste
11. Making money on eBay
12. Not for profit business practice
13. Dog friendly pubs and walks
14. Blogs
15. A year like no other
16. My income 2016
17. Current notes (just scrap really, where I record all my day to day must do items, phone numbers, addresses, wages, invoicing etc).
18. Massage therapy
19. Blank
20. Blank

Each is designed for making notes, recording thoughts and things learned from audios and books and life. Many are potential embryonic books themsleves. Some will no doubt slip into disuse and oblivion, possibly to be resurrected at some future ‘right moment’. Possibly not. Perhaps what I want to do above all else is to try to communicate the reality, that our lives are our own. That we can live the life we choose minute by minute, day by day, and that such a life can be fluid and undefined. So often we live under a limiting sense of inadequacy, by which I mean we often think (dream) of doing things, but never explore them fully because we feel unable, constrained by a life we chose decades before and limited by an internal feeling that our health, fitness, inner strength, physical resources, mental capacity, natural ability and so on are just not “enough”.

I am not suggesting that anyone else should live the life I choose, for that is mine and my journey is unique to me. But whatever you have inside you – that draws you – is the life that you can choose for yourself. I grew three children from scratch before I ever got around to growing myself. Often times we expanded each other and I met some truly catalytic people along the way, but in the end I had to choose for myself  – essentially to “suck it and see”. This is the life I choose: To try. To test. To learn. To grow. To try. Then as the Levellers song so eloquently puts it:

“…and if this life is not for me, then I will choose another.”

I took a little look into cupboard two today and realised that I haven’t opened it before over the past month. That seems a good indication that the things in there might not be needed and – on further investigation – this turns out to be the case.

It contains:

• a plastic tub of decorative houseware, such as candles and my 50th birthday present from Alison and Lloyd, which is a framed drawing of the three of us in rat form,
• an air compressor that might only rarely be needed to re-inflate a tyre in an emergency,
• a spare wash-bag,
• an empty plastic container.

I decide to remove all of these things, stow the air compressor away under the seats, put the tub of houseware into the bunk space (less accessible) and take the rest out of the van when I am next in Newcastle. Instead, I have filled the space with two plastic tubs full of dog stuff (leads, harnesses, bowls, treats etc) that have been on the bunk, as they have been used quite frequently over the last few weeks. Tomorrow I travel back to Newcastle to spend some time with Pete. We’re going to a Stephen Wilson gig on Saturday evening at the City Hall. Looking forward to it!