I’ve been travelling around Australia, my home, as a 5th generation Spanish-Irish Catholic (lapsed) Anglo-Saxon Quadlingual Australian since September 2013 without a home base of any sort.
I travel, I housesit, I stay in hotels, motels, backpacker hostels, caravans, campgrounds, take overnight planes, trains, buses, automobiles, and I walk, walk, walk, I could walk from here to Moruya. (Only 10kms, which is not such a feat, but 36kms a day is not unheard of nor unusual.)
I work, eat, drink, relax in pubs, clubs, cafes, restaurants, bars, takeaway shops, shopping malls - the list goes on.
And so do I!
But mostly, I meet people.
Like the bloke who saw me standing in awe outside the Toronto Hotel, Lake Macquarie, New South Wales, Australia about a month ago.
He stopped to agree what an amazing place it is, told me some of its history, and then we walked up to the shopping plaza and shared each other’s lives in about ten minutes! (Mostly about our respective former and after lives as husbands and dads. I really click with blokes who are separated/divorced yet respectful of their former spouse/mother to their children. It’s just… common decency and respect.)
On parting, he said I could come to his shop some time, and we’ll go to the hotel for beers one afternoon.
I did. We did. I met his mates. And I now have a new mate. I bought him lunch at that hotel with my oldest mate Ted on my last full day in Toronto.
And I’ll leave a glowing review of the hotel and my blokey mate’s business on Google Maps.
This is an absolute joy of my life: meeting new people, discovering new places, sharing the good stuff publicly, feeding back any challenging elements quietly, discreetly, and directly to the venue, and sharing only the good info with anyone who wants to know it.
You know the song, sing it with me: 
Accentuate the positives
Eliminate the negatives
Latch on to the affirmative
And don’t…
You know what? Sometimes ‘Mister In Between’ is ok! I leave out the last line of the chorus. (I’m more of a fan of the Ms_s and Mrs_s than the Misters, but that’s another story, for another time and place. 
)
It’s a privilege and a pleasure to be a Local Guide. 
BQ
