Travelling Hopefully

John was always a bit of a loner.  Now don’t get me wrong he enjoyed the rough and tumble of friends and sports like most boys but unlike many people he was not afraid of his own company and liked nothing better than a long solitary walk in the countryside. He would carefully note the seasonal changes and feel at one with all the life that was there.

He lived in a small West Country industrial and market town and his parents in their council house worked in the local factory.  He fared reasonably well at school but he had no great intellectual skills or ambitions and it seemed that he would follow on with his school friends to work and play locally.

As the time came to consider leaving school he was however in some way dissatisfied with this life plan.  He had several girl friends but absolutely no desire to settle down with any of them and start a family so he pondered deeply during his solitary walks.  Then suddenly the day came with a meeting that would change his life for ever.

Like most of his friends he had gone to the local one day agricultural and business show but he got up early and walked there and wandered around the stands just as the show opened.  He latched on to the army stand that was being run by the army display team that was part of the show entertainments.  He quickly got talking to one of the team about life in the army and suddenly realised that this was what he really wanted to do.  He was not afraid of discomfort; in fact some of his favourite walks had been done in bad weather when there was no one about.  He was also pretty fit and a good footballer.  He also liked the idea of being posted overseas to see other countries.  So at the end of his school life he joined up as an infantryman.

He rapidly learned that the art of survival in difficult conditions is order and discipline and fell into the pattern greatly enjoying the life in all its aspects.  Now this was at the height of the cold war and was a very quiet time militarily and although he saw service in Aden, Cyprus and even Northern Ireland the risks were not very great and he was seldom shot at or fired back in anger.

His military career was unspectacular as he had no great desire for promotion but his age and experience did lead a promotion to lance corporal in charge of a land rover two privates and an anti tank missile launcher trained to drive around Europe unsupported and hide and kill the soviet tanks if ever they tried to attack.  He also spent some time in snow holes in the north of Norway.

All too soon he had completed his full service career and was retired with a small pension.  This was when his problems started.  He did not find any of the sorts of jobs that were open to him remotely interesting for any length of time so he drifted from one basic job to another as the whim led him living in a range of poor quality lodgings and hostels and even on the street for a while.  It was during one of these Spartan episodes that he suddenly had his big idea.  He never did really.like cities he had only stayed there because it was so easy to find a different job when he was fed up with the current one.  So the following day he packed up his kit put it on his back and headed for the West Country. 

His parents were dead, they did not last much beyond retirement but he still had a few contacts there and eventually managed to find what he was looking for, an old four wheeled cart base.  He then adapted it to modern use with rubber tyred wheels and built a simple box on top of it this would do for his living accommodation.  His contacts and part of his army gratuity which he had saved got him a suitable horse to pull the cart and a dog for companionship and security. 

This was how he started his new life as a solitary itinerant wandering his local lanes.  He had to keep on the move because he could only legally stay anywhere for a day or two but he knew a whole range of little hideaways.  His small pension provided his food and basic needs and he earned a little more from time to time doing odd jobs.  He knew that he could not do this for ever but until then his cart was his home and he continued travelling hopefully.

Notes on this story

This is a fictional story based on one simple fact.  we have a local solitary itinerant who is regularly seen camping on various grass verges and similar spots in the area during a large part of the year.  He has been interviewed by the local press and some details published but my understanding is that his real life story is totally different from the one that I have created for him.

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