Where Are We Now

By Dan Colegate

Perfect words to create a quiet moment, wherever you are.

Inspired by six years of nomadic adventures through Europe in a campervan, this collection of 49 poems focuses on the 'little' things that affect us all, such as life, love, death, telling the truth, and what are we all doing here in the first place?

If you've ever felt lost, overwhelmed or confused by the modern, busy and relentless world, these poems are intended to help steer you back to what really matters.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dan Colegate
• Release date: Apr 8, 2020
• ISBN: 9780463750766

Dan Colegate

Roll the clock back six or seven years and Dan Colegate was just another educated fool chasing the impossible dream of future success at the expense of current happiness. Then he got ill and nearly died.A few months later he and his life partner, Esther, took off in a second-hand motorhome to tour Europe and haven't looked back. They've visited more mountains than they can shake a stick at, cycled up a lot of them, run up a few more, adopted a dog who turned out to be pregnant, kept four of the puppies and can currently still be found meandering around in a motorhome full of smiles, dog hair and occasional barking (from the humans).Dan likes to write about their adventures as honestly as possible instead of sugar-coating the reality of what it's like to live in a small space, be it a tent or a motorhome, with your romantic partner and a pile of furry friends. The good times are amazing, the tough times are intense and trying to walk the middle line is a daily practice.Dan is also very good at Zumba, a fact he has only proved once and is unlikely to do so again.

Book preview

Introduction

I’ve always loved words and stories, although it took me a very long time to realise just how powerful and important they are.

My love affair with stories began when I was very young. As a child I read a lot, usually at night. I’d lie face down on the edge of my bed with my bedroom door propped open while holding a book open on the floor so that I could read by the light from the hallway. That way, if mum or dad happened to go to the bathroom I could easily roll back into bed and pretend to be asleep instead of reading yet another book at 4 a.m on a school night. It was during these quiet, private, most-treasured moments that I first heard White Fang howl, charged into Mordor with Frodo and saw Poirot twirl his moustaches. Even back then I saw getting lost in a good story as my way of melting into happiness.

Yet I never saw my reading life as part of ‘real’ life, and I certainly didn’t consider my reading as being anything more than entertainment. The world around me seemed to allow a certain amount of fun and escapism, but only once the serious stuff was taken care of, which is probably why I’d try and steal so much extra reading time by staying up all night with my books.

Roll forward into adulthood and I was a scientist and I was a sportsman. I had a first-class Oxbridge chemistry degree, a PhD and an academic job. At weekends I would wear lycra and make my legs hurt from the saddle of my road bike, periodically entering races which hurt even more. I still read books, although they felt more like a guilty pleasure, wasting time I could be spending doing something useful.

A few more years later I nearly died. That’s the short version of course, although it is arguably the most important detail. A few months after that my wonderful partner, Esther, and I drove away from our suburban life, our jobs and (we hoped) our worries in a second-hand motorhome. We told our friends we’d be back in a year but we secretly hoped it would be longer. That was five years ago now and we are still leading a nomadic life.

Living a life removed from so many of the structures we’d grown up to consider normal, even essential, has taught us many things. For example, it’s shown us how few material things we need to be genuinely happy, and that having fewer possessions is even part of happiness for us. It’s compelled us to take a crash course in how we communicate with each other. It’s proved that even when circumstances seem frightening and bleak, that what we need the most might be just an instant away. And it’s shown us that, ultimately, we can never really run away from our worries because