My life is not particularly conventional, and I have spent plenty of time with the outcasts and misfits — junkies, hookers, trannies, squatters, homeless, queers, immigrants, mentally ill, kinksters, etc. Have had a lot of struggles and gotten quite a few bruises along the way, and I have lost my way often. But a wayward life also gives a more rounded view of our society, and has taken me to places and situations my "straight and normal" friends would never know about.

You learn not to judge so quickly, as you've not walked in other people's shoes, and to have compassion — yet not be an enabler for dysfunction, either. In a way, the real artists in society are those who manage to scratch a decent existence outside of the neat boxes are are offered. I really miss my "posh squat" in London, although it wasn't spiritually healthy for me.

This hanging around respectably and responsibly waiting for events to move life along is hard work. Maybe mass awakening brings me a new role?